Montreal (#3) dances to win over Boston (#7)

By Vile Love It

Three minutes before the bout between Montreal’s New Skids on the Block (#3), Montreal, Quebec and the Boston Derby Dames (#7), Boston, MA began the DJ played LMFAO’s “I’m Sexy and I Know it.” If you know Montreal, you know that was an invitation to get down and get funky. In an atypical show of prebout camaraderie Boston and Montreal wiggled and giggled together putting on a show for the fans complete with competing pushups and floor spins.

And then they lined up on the jammer line and got down to business.

Boston exploded through the pack in the first jam to grab lead but had to call it off before points were scored. Then Montreal’s jammers made quick work of Boston’s defense and Boston’s jammers were stymied by Montreal’s cycling wall of blockers. When Boston was able to earn lead jam they frequently had to call it off before they could score because Montreal would be hot on their tails.

Eight minutes into the bout Montreal held a comfortable lead 26-4 holding Boston scoreless for many of the early jams.

Montreal continued to add up the points even when they were at a pack disadvantage. Boston’s walls had trouble containing Montreal’s jammers for any length of time. With 11 minutes left in the half, Montreal was in the lead 97-13.

Boston’s blockers kept up their march to the penalty box and Montreal kept taking advantage of it significantly increasing their lead throughout the period. When Montreal did have a power jam, and they only had three of them, they capitalized on them to stack up the points.

There seemed to be a steady stream of blockers in and out of the penalty box and few jams seemed to start out with five skaters from both teams and end with those skaters. Though the teams had even total penalty minutes (33 for Boston, 32 for Montreal) Montreal was able to continue to make a positive difference on the track even when they were down.

At the half Montreal had a commanding lead 150-24.

“Montreal is a team that we’ve played frequently to the point that sometimes it feels like it’s on the home team level, when you play the same teams over and over again,” said Boston’s Lil Paine. “We came in ranked 7th and knew that we couldn’t go down any further. We knew that they were going to come in with a chip on their shoulder because of some of their previous games in the tournament.”

The second half was a very different game for Boston. They outscored Montreal by 20 points and earned lead jammer over 50% of the second period. Boston’s one and only power jam came at the end of the game and Lil Paine, who was wearing the star, quickly racked up 29 points breaching the century mark and earning the raucous cheers of the crowd.

“They came out like a pack of wolves and we had to take a few minutes to figure out what we needed to do to control the game. When we came out in the second half of the game our execution was much better. Our penalties were significantly lower. We were trying to control the pack speed as much as we could and we held them to less points,” Lil Paine said.

But, the payoff that Boston got from their strategy adjustment came too late and Montreal chalked up the win.

“When we communicate and have fun with the other team before the game it helps us to lose our nerves and play our game. We know it’s competitive on the track but it feels like we’re playing against friends when we have fun before the game,” said Montreal’s Iron Wench. “It helps us communicate better on the track and stay calm on the bench.”

Montreal (#3) 222
Boston (#7) 116