After a beautiful weekend of warm weather and blue skies, Stanford emerged victorious in the first ultimate tournament of the season. Stanford's victories were not without challenges and there were a number of hard-fought games all weekend long.

Saturday Pool Play

Pool A went according to seed without too many surprises. In its first game of the tournament, Stanford came out flat and went down to Southern California (USC) 3-2 after USC converted on a number of Brit "Mash" Boshein's (#11) hucks. The defending national champions tightened up their defense to finish the game 13-3, but teams should take note of USC's effective long plays. In fact, USC only lost to UC-Santa Cruz by two points later in the day. UC-Santa Cruz gained an early lead against Stanford (4-3) before Stanford took half 7-4 and the game 13-6. All day, Tegwyn Lewis-Pine seemed to be filling the role of handler nicely for UCSC and was a good pairing with Lilian Berla in the backfield. Zoe Hirchner was the team's go-to cutter, making her first appearance of the year with UCSC after being abroad all fall. The game to win the pool between Stanford and UC-Santa Barbara was a game full of turn-overs and long points, and it ended up being capped at 10-5, Stanford. UCSB plays a spread offense that isolates its athletic cutters going long, and Alden Fletcher had been catching goals off of hucks all day. While Stanford adjusted its receiver coverage to deny the open huck, UCSB adjusted its marks to put more pressure on Stanford's cutters. The score at half (7-2) belied how hard UCSB was playing. In particular, Allison Maddox (#11) matched up well against Stanford's Enessa Janes (#7) and they battled for the few points they were both playing at the same time.

Pool B featured an incredibly tight game between UCLA and UC-Davis to win the pool. Games on Saturday were to be played to 13, but this was one match-up that was capped due to many long points. UC-Davis' offense runs on the give-and-go and breakmark throws of its main thrower, Victoria "Chuckie" Wilk. Davis has a trio of top players that is rounded out by the experience of Sarah Pittiglio and Lindsey Riemenschneider. UCLA often relies on team energy to fire itself up, but it couldn't quite convert enough of its chances and couldn't shut down Davis' top players consistently. As a result, although UCLA may have the advantage in terms of speed and athleticism across the board, Davis emerged victorious 9-8. Claremont wasn't able to break the stride of the pool's top two seeds, although it did hold off the two B-teams it played. Sidney Fleischer's injury definitely made itself felt on the Claremont roster, although the rest of the team will continue to step up in her absence. Due to a difficulties of a 15-team format, the second place pool finisher with the best point differential was granted a bye into quarters along with the pool winners. With its close loss to Davis and large margin of victory in its other games, UCLA got to sleep in on Sunday with the three pool winners.

Pool C also held an upset as UC-San Diego beat UC-Berkeley to earn the bye into quarters. Berkeley may have had more returners on its roster than UCSD this year, but at this tournament Berkeley was still working on integrating players into new roles. At future tournaments, Berkeley's offense should be firing more consistently. UCSD came out fired up at won convincingly (around 13-7) with Kelly "Muff" Jarvis (#7) and Vivi Mai (#24) stepping up time and again. The rest of the UCSD roster showed its depth as well. The other main upset of this pool was in Cal Poly SLO's win over Cal Tech. This victory matched-up Cal Poly against Stanford B in pre-quarters on Sunday.

Sunday Bracket Play

After pool play, teams were reseeded for Sunday's brackets. The tournament organizers decided to eschew a more standardized format and focused on avoiding rematches in pre-quarters and quarters. As a result, the number one and number two seeds ended up on the same side of the bracket, slated to meet in semis.

There were no upsets or surprises in pre-quarters, and of the four quarterfinals games, only one was not a blow-out. Stanford handled Cal Poly SLO 15-2, UC-Davis beat UC-Santa Barbara by a large margin, and UC-San Diego was in control of its game against UC-Santa Cruz. The game between UCLA and UC-Berkeley was much closer. After an intense battle, the game was capped and UCLA emerged victorious 12-10.

UCLA played UC-San Diego in one semifinal game while Stanford played UC-Davis in the other. While the weather was still pretty nice, there was enough of a wind for UCLA to play zone against UCSD for most of its game. Apparently, UCSD had not practiced its zone offense much before the weekend and had trouble integrating newer players into the zone O. There were a number of points where UCSD would work the disc all the way up the field to its goal line before turning it over, only to have UCLA huck the disc the length of the field for a subsequent score. Tall receivers like Emily Gauthier (#10) helped the success of this strategy for UCLA and the final score was 11-4. The other semifinal game started out much closer; tied at 3's before Stanford pushed ahead to take half 8-4. Stanford converted a couple goals by playing zone D when Wilk was not in for Davis and had a hard time stopping her forehand when she was in the game. The two teams traded points during the second half until the cap went on and Stanford won 11-6.

The finals proved to be an exciting game between Stanford and UCLA with multiple runs by each team. UCLA jumped out to an early 2-0 lead before Stanford tied it up after consecutive points with lay-out blocks by freshman Emily Damon (#18). UCLA answered back right away and then capitalized on a Stanford turnover near its own goal-line. Stepping up its defensive pressure, Stanford went on a six point run to take half 8-4.

By scoring right after halftime, Stanford increased its lead to 5 points before the two teams traded till 11-6. UCLA scored the next point with no turnovers and then set a zone D which was able to generate a quick Callahan goal. Lead by the pinpoint inside-out breaks of Anna "Maddog" Nazarov (#) and Lisa "Clyde" Vampola (#16), UCLA continued to score its next two goals relatively efficiently and brought the score to 11-10. For the first time all weekend, Stanford put its three top guns in on the same point and Janes caught the next two goals. Stanford scored the next point and was within one of winning the game before some costly endzone turnovers let UCLA start another run. UCLA strung three points together, coming within one at 14-13 before Stanford finished it off. Throughout the game, Stanford kept a pretty open rotation, especially trying to get its handlers other than Lauren Casey #11 more big game experience. UCLA played with a ton of heart and grit during the entire game, showcasing the team's athleticism and determination.

Last year, UC-Santa Cruz announced they were serious about the season by upsetting Stanford and winning the Santa Barbara Invite. While UCSC isn't likely to do that again this year after the toll graduation took on its roster, the question is who else will step up to the plate and challenge Stanford for the tournament win?

From my biased vantage point, Stanford appears to be currently a step ahead of the rest of the schools at the tournament. However, there should be considerable parity between the next four teams. My money is on Stanford, UC-Berkeley, and UCLA to win their pools and make the semis of the tournament. UC-Davis and UC-San Diego will also be right in the mix, and there should be a battle in both pools B and C between the top seeds as both Davis and UCSD could easily have an upset waiting for UCLA and Berkeley, respectively.

Playing on its home turf, UC-Santa Barbara could give Stanford a game in pool play, but it won't be able to advance past quarters. Thus, UCSB, UC-Santa Cruz, and Claremont will probably round out the quarters bracket. Teams from the bottom half of the initial rankings should be mindful that UCSC and Claremont are not invincible and could be prone to an upset, especially if either team faces USC or Stanford B.

There is a pretty steep drop off after the top teams at the tournament, as most of the remaining spots are filled by young programs and B teams. However, no one should underestimate the California B-team rivalry. Stanford B, UC-Berkeley B, UC-San Diego B, and UCLA B will continue to face off against each other this season, striving for the right to call themselves the best B-team in the state. Still, it will be a challenge for any of the B-teams to win the beer bracket against other A-teams.

California teams should count themselves lucky to get the opportunity to play ultimate outside on grass so early in the season. This tournament often is used as a chance for rookies to gain valuable experience while the team tests itself against regional rivals. To raise the stakes slightly, the results of the tournament are expected to factor rather heavily into the next NUMP poll rankings.