Round 1: Two close games this round, one predicted and one surprising.  BNOGO comes out strong against Godiva and their offenses trade points to 4-4.  BNOGO is a different team this year, stronger, with a big pickup in Sarah Smith (#1).  She's often the reset when the offense gets stagnant, and her break marks (low and high) open the field up for BNOGO's speedy cutters. 

On the other hand, Godiva has pretty offense, but sometimes it hides out.  The team is certainly different from the dominating crews of the 90s, but still has some superstars.  More importantly, they've taught the younger players how the Godiva O works.  A big change from last year is the team dynamic; this year there seem to be more contributors, and the offense runs through everyone on the field.  After taking a timeout at 4-4, Godiva came out on fire.  Their offense stopped making mistakes and took advantages of miscues by BNOGO.  BNOGO brought it back to 11-9, but never got any closer, and Godiva won 15-10.

The other close game was a big surprise: Prime came out flat against a fired up Brute Squad, and the Boston team went up 4-3.  Prime tied it on a long huck that took out Brute Squad's captain, Erin Baumgartner (#27), a big loss for such a small team.  Brute Squad has low numbers but a very athletic roster, and their women never stop running.  Prime had perhaps overlooked this first game and was not playing with their usual intensity.  Brute Squad could have kept it close, but had lots of trouble in the redzone.  At 11-9, there was a fifteen minute discussion over an in call; this point eventually went Prime's way and they never looked back.  Final score: 15-9 Prime. 

All other games were easy wins for the top seeds.

Round 2:  Another heartbreaker for Brute Squad, as they keep it close with Backhoe but lose at the end.  Brute Squad ran an effective 1-3-3 that Backhoe had some trouble with; but Brute Squad is stagnant in the stack against Backhoe's straight-up defense.  Backhoe has some hard running defenders and good marks, and they like to look long.  In the end, Brute Squad's endzone execution hurt them once again, and Backhoe won 15-10.

There were actually two heartbreakers this round.  The closest game of the day was Ozone vs. Nemesis.  The teams played tight the entire game, with Nemesis relying on big throws to Melanie Koskamp (#42), who pulled down some incredible catches and Ds.  Indeed, with Ozone up 15-14, she grabbed another to make it 15 all - but the throw was called back on a defensive foul call on the thrower.  Many minutes of discussion ensued (it's a mystery why women's teams are so reluctant to use observers - the stoppages were excruciating).  Finally, the disc went back to the thrower.  Nemesis turns it over after a couple of passes, Ozone completes a few, and then an Ozone player lets loose a swilly, hanging swing pass.  A Nemesis player D's the throw in the air, hitting it far out of bounds, and then contacts the (much shorter) Ozone receiver as  she comes down.  The Ozone player calls foul.  There's a lot of talking.  Some of the Ozone players think it's not a foul, but the original receiver thinks she had a second bid on the disc.  Eventually, the disc goes back to the original thrower, and Ozone scores about 5 seconds later.  Some members of Nemesis, infuriated at what they saw as a stolen game, refused to shake hands.

Round 3:  Here's where the negativity comes back to bite Nemesis.  They get down big to Electric Mayhem and can never get out of the hole.  To Mayhem's credit, they take advantage of Nemesis's lack of D.  Nemesis seems more concerned with how badly Ozone is getting beat by Riot; by the time they wake up and start trying again, Mayhem has gained confidence and won't give back the edge.  In by far the biggest upset of the tournament so far, Electric Mayhem beats Nemesis 15-11, and Nemesis will need a lot of help to not be eliminated from contention tomorrow.

Brute Squad, after two close games to open the day, looked tired against Zanzara.  Zanzara has a seemingly endless supply of slim blond girls in visors, and loves to huck it.  They also happen to be pretty lax with the disc, and this hurt them against Prime and Backhoe.  But versus Brute Squad they are well-matched, and have a lot more energy.  Brute Squad continues to falter outside the endzone and Zanzara connects on some hucks to take half 8-3.  Brute Squad makes a noble effort to come back, and every player leaves it all on the field.  But in the end they can't make up the deficit, and Zanzara wins 15-10.

In the other games:  Godiva versus Rare Air started close, with Rare Air playing very tight D.  Godiva's offense was really clicking though, and the field seemed wide open, with continues open and timed correctly for every pass.  Godiva's D could use some work and they may run into trouble tomorrow; but today they showed that their offense can still win games.  Rare Air had some sweet moves, particularly from Alex Snyder (#44), but couldn't force the D on Godiva.  Godiva got a lead early in the second half and maintained it, winning 15-12.  Prime versus Backhoe was the final close game of this round.  The teams are pretty well-matched; both love to throw long and play hard-running man defense.  Close most of the way, with lots of hucks and turnovers, Prime managed to open a small lead and hold onto it.  Prime wins 15-12.  Safari had a decent day overall, playing close with Schwa, and dominating Clutch in the 3-4 game.  It will be interesting to see how the hard-running, fun-loving San Diego girls match up against the East coast teams, in particular BNOGO and Brute Squad.

Fury and Riot both romped through the day, with Riot in particular dominating.  No team scored more than 4 on Riot, and Fury held Schwa to only 7 points.