Fort Wayne, IN

Arch Rival sustains win over Wasatch

By Whacks Poetic

The final game of Saturday night saw the team from St. Louis, Arch Rival Roller Girls taking on Wasatch Roller Derby from Salt Lake City, Utah to determine who would play the Rose City Rollers for 5th place tomorrow. The Arch Rival Roller Girls took the lead in the first jam and, with a minor blip 15 minutes in, they never relinquished their advantage on the scoreboard, finishing the game 235-154.

The game started with a 31-point run by Arch Rival jammers Mighty Mighty Boston, South City Shiner, Brickyard and Smarty McFly. Moonraker, one of Wasatch’s primary jammers, wouldn’t be seen on the jam line again after her second penalty in three times wearing the star on her head. Wasatch switched to a rotation of Ali3 Kitt3n, Harry Slaughter and Bunz Bunny for the majority of the bout. The twelfth jam of the first half started about halfway through the period. Bunz Bunny got lead jammer status for Wasatch and South City Shiner was having no luck getting out of the pack. Wasatch briefly took the lead 49-48 at about the fourteen minute mark but that lead was short lived when Bunz Bunny was sent to the box on a back block. The pack advantage shifted during the jam from 4-2 in favor of Wasatch to 4-2 in favor of Arch Rival as the Wasatch blockers attempted to kill Bunz’ penalty. South City Shiner, unable to get out of the pack, star passed to Arch Rival pivot May Require Stitches but before May Require Stitches could put the helmet cover on her head, the Arch Rival coach noticed that South City Shiner had passed the star from out of bounds. In a moment of fortune, May Require Stitches heard her coach yelling to pass it back and South City Shiner was able to legally pass the helmet cover to May Require Stitches once she returned to an inbounds position, avoiding a jammer penalty. At the end of the jam, Wasatch’s brief moment in the lead was over and the scoreboard read 58-50 for Arch Rival. Arch Rival then began to slowly pull away and at halftime the score was 99-69 for the St. Louis team.

© Bob Dunnell

The second half began well for Wasatch with a 3-0 jam for Ali3 Kitt3n. The next jam, however, saw Harry Slaughter go to the box on a back block joining two Wasatch blockers already sitting there. Arch Rival was able to score 19 points with Harry Slaughter in the box and the score five minutes into the second half stood at 118-72. Wasatch had a good run in the next several jams with their jammers putting up 42 points before Bunz Bunny was sent to the box for 2 minutes, one for a back block and one for insubordination when she failed to leave the track for her penalty. Brickyard scored 30 points for Arch Rival and the score was 148-114 as Mighty Mighty Boston stood on the jammer line to begin the next jam.

Bunz Bunny would be sprung from the box when Mighty Mighty Boston low blocked a Wasatch blocker and that jam would go in Wasatch’s favour 20-9. The score reading 157-134 at the end of it. The point differential remained about the same until Bunz Bunny went to the box twice in one jam with 7 minutes left in the game. South City Shiner started a 30-point scoring run and May Require Stitches finished it after a successful star pass. Brickyard would add another 13 points while Bunz Bunny remained in the box in the subsequent jam. The game would end with Arch Rival pulling slightly more ahead, scoring 10 points in the final minute and a half of the game.

“I feel really good about that game. I feel like Arch Rival struggles at tournaments and I already feel better about our performance this tournament," said Smarty McFly, Arch Rival jammer. "Losing to Ohio was really tough for us but I feel good today to be able to take home two wins and be able to play Rose City tomorrow. The opportunity to play teams that we’ve never played before is awesome and that’s the good thing about divisions.”

“I think we had some really good tight walls in the first half and ran into some penalty trouble in the second half. Any time we had four on the track we were doing really well and just the numbers game got the best of us,” said Bruiser Ego, Wasatch co-captain.

Arch Rival Roller Girls take on the Rose City Rollers for fifth place at 2 pm on Sunday and Wasatch Roller Derby will face Cincinnati in the battle for 7th place at noon on Sunday.

Final Score

(3) Arch Rival Roller Girls 235
(7) Wasatch Roller Derby 154