The real reason Gendors lost in the Semis

The game was close, with no team up by more than one point. When we scored upwind, they answered scoring upwind the next point. If the first four points hadn't taken 35 minutes to complete, with a score of 2-2 at the end of those 35 minutes, the game looked like it would go to 17-16 with the team who took the wind off the flip.

Everything was on pull up until half, with Gendors taking half 8-7, and our tying it back at 8-8. The game was intense with hard marks, strong defense, close calls and unrelenting pressure from both sides. Both sides often disagreed with calls the other made, and so the observers were well used by both teams.

Soon after the second half started, maybe a point or two into the half, a travel call was made on the field by a Mischief teammate. The call went to the observers, and was overruled by the observer on the far side of the field. Since the observer was standing on the far sideline, Adam approached the observer on our sideline who may have had a better view, and suggested that, if he had a better view, he should say something.

An older man who had been walking along our sidelines for the entire game, immediately went up to Adam and bumped him. Adam describes the bump as an attempt to chest bump him, but the old man's camera was in the way. The man was about six feet tall and about twice as heavy as Adam, so bump could knock him over.

After bumping Adam, the old man stood close, looking down at him and said, "You know, going to the observers makes you look weak."

So, here was a guy who no one knows, who was not a player, by all rights shouldn't be standing within 2 yards of the field, much less standing over one of our players attempting to intimidate him.

Wade heard the exchange as he was walking past, and turned on the man. "Are you with Gendors?" he asked in a loud voice. I didn't see the man's reaction (Megan said he answered yes, though), but I definitely heard Wade's. The man attempted to defend himself, but received a barrage of yells in return. "Your team is cheating! They're double teaming and travelling!" "Oh, sure, let's get the parent's involved." "Because the Gendors are perfect, right? And Black Tide has the best spirit." he continued sarcastically. "I didn't know Black Tide was here!" Towards the end, Wade yelled he should watch out, or he'll die of a heart attack.

The old man slinked off to the far side of the shade tents we had on the sidelines as Wade was more and more fired up.

We scored three of the next four points, and went on to outscore the Gendors 7-4 in the second half. Wade was on fire, bringing the rest of the team up in intensity, and we won the game 15-13.

Weak, indeed. It's hard to be weak when the other side is cheating.

Calling the other team cheaters in a sport where mutual respect is a key element of the game may seem disrepectful but consider this: the Gendors would zone by having a marker on the thrower and two players within four feet of the thrower for more than half the time they were on defense. When Wade was unable to punt a disc because a women defender, who was not is marker, was able to touch him during his throw (incidental contact, so no foul, but a double team because Wade is not ten feet long), Kris told the observers they needed to take action. They agreed and told Gendors to step back on their zone cup pointmen. They did, and lost their ability to stop us.

Funny how, when the cheating stops, the better team wins.