Fort Wayne, IN

Cincinnati takes last-jam win over Bleeding Heartland

By Whacks Poetic

In the first game of the 2013 WFTDA Division 1 playoffs, 8 seed Cincinnati Rollergirls of Cincinnati, Ohio played 9 seed Bleeding Heartland Rollergirls of Bloomington, Indiana, in Fort Wayne, Indiana. These teams are very familiar with each other having already played twice this year; each taking one win. Most recently, Cincinnati schooled the team from Bloomington winning 358 to 173 in April. This was the game that mattered most, though.

There were two keys to this game: blocker penalties and K Lethal, the Cincinnati jammer who jammed in the last 8 jams of the game for her team. The game started with a pair of 0-0 jams, suggesting that the game was going to be quite a nail-biter, which it proved to be, with Cincinnati winning in the final jam, 217-214.

Scoring started in the third jam when Nuck L. Sammie managed to open up a hefty lead facing only 2 Cincinnati blockers in the pack and scoring 24 points. That jam proved to be typical of most of the first half with Bleeding Heartland going on a scoring run for most of the first half aided by many Cincinnati blocker penalties and a couple of Cincinnati jammer penalties. At the start of jam 14, it was 102-28. At the end of the same jam, however, it was 102-50 with Cincinnati jammer Hannah Barbaric being sent to the box for illegally calling off the jam after scoring 22 points on a power jam when Terror D’Bits sat in the penalty box for a track cut. Nuck L Sammie, taking advantage of Cincinnati’s penalty troubles managed to rack up 30 points skating easily and quickly around lone Cincinnati blocker on the track, Sailor Scary for several of those laps. The momentum, however, was a-changing and in the last three jams of the first half, Cincinnati picked up lead for those final minutes of the first period and scored 57 points to bring the score to 137-107 for Bleeding Heartland at half time.

The second half proved to be Bleeding Heartland’s undoing. The penalty trouble plaguing Cincinnati in the first half seemed to shift its focus to the Bloomington team Cincinnati picked up lead in the first four jams and began to catch up to Bleeding Heartland on the scoreboard. After Cincinnati jammer Wheezy experienced trouble with the Bleeding Heartland blockers in several jams, Cincinnati shortened their already small jammer rotation substantially with K Lethal jamming all but one jam for the last quarter of the game. The general trend for the second half was K Lethal getting lead and then putting up a 4-0 or 3-0 jams although a couple of power jams for both teams managed to sneak their way into the bout. At the beginning of the final jam, K Lethal had jammed for the previous 7 and the score stood at 214-193. K Lethal returned to the jammer line against a boxed Terror D’Bits for Bleeding Heartland.

K Lethal: “I felt amazing. It couldn’t have gone any better for me. I live to skate when we’re down 10 points, 20 points in the last jam. I feel like a very clutch player and I play well under pressure.”

Clutch player she most definitely was as she managed to score 20 points on the power jam and needed just one more as Terror returned to the track for her initial pass. After passing the pack one final time, K Lethal tapped her hands on her hips, ending the game 217-213 for Cincinnati.

Bleeding Heartland, however, was not discouraged.

Captain Pele’s Melee stating, “I think it translated in the way we played how bad we wanted it. It’s just unfortunate. You know, both teams were getting a lot of penalties and unfortunately we picked up ours in the second half. It’s not a game I’m upset or ashamed about it at all. We played fantastic. You know, just, time ran out.”

Final Score

(8) Cincinnati Rollergirls 217
(9) Bleeding Heartland Rollergirls 213

Cincinnati advances to play 1 seed Denver Roller Dolls from Denver, Colorado; Bleeding Heartland moves to consolation bracket and will play the loser of Rose City Rollers versus London Roller Girls on Day 2.