Fort Wayne, IN

Ohio Roller Girls upset Arch Rival Roller Girls

By Whacks Poetic

The hunger for an upset permeated the Coliseum in Fort Wayne, Indiana after Wasatch Roller Derby was denied their chance at making 2013 WFTDA Championships by Montreal Roller Derby in the bout preceding this one. Ohio Roller Girls from Columbus, Ohio sensed this and delivered what the fans wanted--the first seeding upset of the 2013 WFTDA Division 1 Playoffs. The 6 seed Ohio team managed to defeat the 3 seed, Arch Rival Roller Girls from St. Louis, Missouri 218-166. The win did not come easily, however; it was an intense battle for 60 minutes on the flat track with both teams performing valiantly.

The game started off well for Arch Rival with their jammer Mighty Mighty Boston taking lead jammer and scoring 4 unanswered points in the first jam. Ohio Roller Girls responded in the next jam by gaining lead before their jammer was boxed for a track cut. Ohio managed to contain South City Shiner for the majority of jam and the two minutes finished 3-4. Brickyard, however, did Arch Rival proud putting up 24-0 in the next jam with The Smacktivist still sitting in the box. Another pair of 4-0 jams for Arch Rival via Smarty McFly and Mighty Mighty Boston were followed up by a 25-0 jam by South City Shiner in which both the Arch Rival jammer and the Ohio jammer, Phoenix Bunz, went to the box. As the dust settled from the jammer switch out, the score stood at 64-4. South City Shiner started the next jam from the box and returned to it with a back block following Phoenix Bunz’ own penalty. This resulted in an ever so rare jammerless jam. Ohio won the jam scoring 15-0.

Photo by John Wijsman

With 16 minutes remaining in the first half, Arch Rival went on a scoring spree racking up 33 unanswered points before Ohio managed to draw a track cut off of Arch Rival jammer Brickyard and The Smacktivist capitalized on being the sole jammer on the track scoring 32 points and bringing Ohio back to within striking distance with Arch Rival 101-65. Two jams later, the Ohio blockers were doing a great job keeping South City Shiner in pack while The Smacktivist scored 10 points. Shiner then was sent to the penalty box on a track cut. The Smacktivist managed to add another 20 points to the 10 she’d already scored in the jam. At the end of the half, the score stood 110-98 for Arch Rival and Ohio was mounting a comeback.

Ohio continued their momentum in the second half and took the lead 131-121 against Arch Rival in jam seven after Arch Rival jammer, Brickyard, was sent to the box. Two jams later facing only 2 blockers from Arch Rival, Ohio jammer Kitty Liquorbottom scored 20 points with South City Shiner unable to get out of the pack. Ohio Roller Girls had managed to put up 52 unanswered points before Smarty McFly managed to get lead against The Smacktivist and scored 2-0 points with the score at the end of that jam being 163-123 for Ohio. It looked like Arch Rival may be able to pull it back in the 16th jam of the period when with 10 minutes left Kitty Liquorbottom was unable to get out of the pack and forced to pass the star to pivot Bratislava Bruiser. Unfortunately, that momentum was short ived as at the start of the next jam, Smarty McFly, Arch Rival jammer, cut the track and The Smacktivist put up 15 points. Play was getting frantic and the next jam saw both teams’ jammers head to the box again and Ohio pulled slightly further ahead to 206-158. The final two jams saw Ohio get lead jammer and end the period with a 12-8 jam in their favor and the game with the only upset of the day 218-166.

“We’re very cool with being underdogs," Ohio captain, Phoenix Bunz said. "We kind of like being the ones no one expects to win and come out better than anyone expects and play to the potential we know we have but it’s nice to surprise people and have teams underestimate us a bit.”

Final Score

(6) Ohio Roller Girls 218
(3) Arch Rival Roller Girls 166

The Ohio Roller Girls will be hoping to upset 2 seed Montreal Roller Derby Saturday at 4pm and Arch Rival Roller Girls will be facing Bleeding Heartland Rollergirls at noon on Saturday.