Detroit, MI

By The Oxford Commakaze

Two first-game winners. Two former D1 teams. Two teams named NRG. But only one could move on to tomorrow’s first-place game and a guaranteed spot in the 2015 International WFTDA Championships -- and that NRG is the Nashville Rollergirls of Nashville, Tenn., as they toppled the Naptown Roller Girls of Indianapolis, Ind., for the first time in the teams’ history in what Nashville jammer Lady Fury referred to as “a nine-year grudge match.”

Photo by Keith Bielat/Derby with Recess

“It was way too close for comfort the whole game, but I guess that’s probably what keeps you in it,” reflected Nashville Jammer Lady Fury. “I had to stop looking at the score because it started making me frantic on the inside.” Both teams were at each other’s heels from the first whistle, with a four-point hit-and-quit jam for Nashville immediately followed by the same for a tie just two minutes into the game. Each team challenged the other’s adaptive defenses and found themselves well-matched, forcing speedy, low-scoring jams and keeping both teams from putting up more than eight points in a single jam - just two scoring passes -- for nearly 10 minutes. Nashville doubled Naptown’s game in those first few minutes, but with only an 11-point lead, the 22-11 score left both teams gunning for points.

Both teams had that opportunity in a messy two-minute jam that kept penalty timers on their toes, with three Jammer penalties and five Blocker penalties, but Nashville won the jam 18-4, thanks Chelsea Dagger’s diligence in getting Naptown’s players sent to the Penalty Box after pushing them out of play. A fast-swarming offense kept Nashville slowly building its lead, but a massive 27-point jam for Naptown’s Scorpiopathic just five minutes later brought the score gap back to single digits, 54-45.

It took just one jam for the game’s first lead change, 58-64, as the Naptown Blockers kept Nashville’s defenders completely separated during a power jam for Maiden America, but that seemed to open the floodgates as three of the next four jams saw lead changes carried by aggressive jamming and split-second offense from Nashville’s Morgan Levy and Naptown’s Mutant Jean. After a brief 71-71 tie, Nashville jumped into the lead with five minutes left in the half and clung to it, if only tenuously, closing the half with just a six-point gap, 93-87.

“Naptown is used to playing in high-intensity games,” explained Naptown’s Crash N2U. “Every game that we play, we put everything that we have on the track. We try to stay calm and focused with intensity. We just did our thing.” But Nashville had no intention of letting Naptown do that, inching the score just out of reach in the first few minutes of the second half, despite a beautiful, gravity-defying apex jump from Jammer Cherry-oto-fire -- even if she did back-block her own blocker to the ground in the process (who promptly high-fived her from the ground for landing the jump and snagging four more points at the whistle).

A 19-point power jam from Maiden America put Naptown back in charge as Asian Sinsation cleared just enough space for her Jammer to get by, and Crash N2U kept Nashville’s returning Jammer Chelsea Dagger at bay behind the pack, clearing the pack on her initial pass with just 20 seconds left in the jam. The momentum see-sawed back to Nashville immediately with a massive 33-point unanswered jam for Lady Fury as she swerved untouched around Naptown’s rapidly diminishing Blockers during a penalty glut to Blockers and Jammers alike that Naptown could ill afford.

Leads rarely lasted long in this game, though, as Naptown immediately took a 15-point power jam of its own to narrow the gap to six points, with renewed energy and an intensely physical jam from Jammer Cherry-oto-fire. Naptown snapped the top position back two jams later as Scorpiopathic traipsed easily up the inside straight-away with just over half the period left, but Nashville pounced on the lead again just as quickly with a hit-and-quit jam from Zip Drive before Naptown could stop her.

“We have a nice, simple saying: Calm clean and mean. Even though it may have seemed chaotic, we went in thinking proactive instead of reactive,” said Nashville’s Lady Fury. “We did not succeed in that every single jam, but we kept reminding ourself of our goal, and I believe that is why we came out on top.”

The mantra worked, helping Nashville gain solid control of the game with just a handful of minutes on the clock, building a 228-173 lead on the strength of offensive/defensive double threats Sugar and Maulin Monroe as their Jammers juked and jumped past Naptown’s continually intimidating walls. But Naptown had one last push left, mounting a 19-point run to close the gap to a theoretically manageable 228-192, with just one second left in the game as the team froze the clock with its last Official Review.

Scorpiopathic popped out for an instant Lead Jammer call as Lady Fury went to the box for a Low Block, giving Naptown two crucial building blocks to try to construct one last lead change, but the 17 points she put up couldn’t overtake the lead Nashville blocked, juked and jumped itself into, closing the game 233-209 in Nashville’s favor. Nashville will move on to play the winner of tonight’s 8 p.m. game between the Sacred City Derby Girls of Sacramento, Calif., and the Chicago Outfit of Chicago, Ill., for first place tomorrow at 6 p.m. Naptown will play the loser of tonight’s game for third place tomorrow at 4 p.m.

FINAL SCORE

Nashville Rollergirls (#1) 233
Naptown Roller Girls (#4) 209