Charleston, WV

By Lexistential Crisis

In the final Friday game of the international WFTDA Division 1 Playoffs in Charleston, the top seed Rose City Rollers of Portland, Oregon (#4) proved their dominance against the 9 seed, Columbia QuadSquad of Columbia, South Carolina (#37).

Photo by Tyler Shaw

Rose City went into this game aiming to get used to the track in order to execute slow walls and slow play. Skater Sarah Gaither explained that they noticed many of the earlier games featured fast packs, but they wanted to be able to control their speed when needed. Everyone on Rose City seemed to quickly adjust to the skating surface, as they were able to contain Columbia’s jammers and control the pack throughout the whole game.

Columbia fought the whole game and showed just how strong they could be, even against a strong Rose City team. Poison Violet broke out of the pack not long after Loren Mutch to earn a point after passing a Rose City blocker in the first jam of the game. Rose City quickly expanded their lead thanks to solid defense, agile jammers, and a few power jams. By the 15 minutes mark Rose City held the lead with 131 points to Columbia’s 15.

A large majority of Rose City’s points in the first half came from power jams, but both teams had five jammer penalties in the first half. Rose City was able to take advantage of those penalties by controlling the pack speed and keeping Columbia’s blockers completely separated. When Rose City jammers were in the box their defense was able to contain the Columbia jammers and minimize the scoring.

Columbia consistently worked on staying together and helping their jammer out of the pack, and their work paid off at many points throughout the game. In the first half, Poison Violet earned the team’s first lead jammer call with about six minutes left in the half. At that point Columbia increased their score to 21 against Rose’s 171. Blockers Cherry Maim’her, Chuck-Town Bruiser, Truck Stop, and Boston Terror all worked together and on their own to halt and take down Rose City’s jammers.

The final jam of the first half was one of the most interesting jams of the entire day in Charleston. Columbia started with only one blocker on the track when jammer Poison Violet blocked Rose City jammer Loren Mutch to the outside of the track. Poison then dragged Mutch all the way around to the pivot line to give her blockers the chance to get out of the box. Upon returning to the pack from the rear, Poison again blocked Mutch to the outside of the track and forced her back around the track to give more blockers the chance to leave the penalty box. Both jammers remained on their initial pass until Poison was sent to the box for a direction of gameplay penalty. Columbia was able to limit Rose’s scoring to only five points on that jam.

Rose City started the second half on a power jam, as Columbia’s jammer sat in the box. They would have eight other power jam opportunities during the second half. Conversely Rose’s jammers cleaned up their play and only went to the box three times during the rest of the game. Columbia’s blockers were in penalty troubles during the second half as well, so there were often only two or three skaters on the track at a time. Rose took advantage of this and added almost 300 points to their score while Columbia only added 26.

The second half also featured a noticeable increase in star passes, as Columbia often successfully passed the jammer helmet cover. The passes worked in their advantage at times as it allowed their jammers to break the pack and either shorten the jam by forcing a call off or pick up a few points by sneaking into the pack on a scoring pass.

Rose brought their score up to 356 and Columbia was up to 51 with about 15 minutes left in the game.

Despite strategic moves from Columbia, Rose City’s defense continued to shut down their jammers in most jams. Shaina Serelson, Mercy, Jes Rivas, Hannah Jennings, and all their teammates worked together as a unit in order to accomplish their goals. Meanwhile, Rose’s jammers were able to put up some massive jams thanks to the quick and fluid offense-to-defense switches of the blockers and their own strength and agility. Loren Mutch, Scald Eagle, and LickerNSplit each had 43, 35, and 39 point jams in the second half, respectively.

The final score was 484 Rose City to 59 Columbia. Rose City continues to the semifinals where they will play Atlanta at 2 pm EDT on Saturday. Columbia moves to the consolation rounds where they will play SoCal or Naptown at 6 pm EDT.

Three of Rose City’s jammers scored over 100 points: Loren Mutch with 145, LickerNSplit with 132, and Scald Eagle with 116. Roarshock Tess was not far from 100 with 91 points. Poison Violet led Columbia with 26 points, Mel Anoma earned 17 points, and Fearless Fritz scored 16.

Final Score

(1) Rose City Rollers 484
(9) Columbia QuadSquad 59