Season Opener
Sunday was the season opener for Orlando Psycho City, and I don't think I've ever seen our ladies play so hard. Maybe it was the excitement of the first game, or maybe we were all just saving our energy for when it really mattered but both games left all who got off the track bruised and exhausted. Up first was the Arkham Assailants and the Serial Thrillers. I was working in the crowd selling poker chips for the chip toss during halftime, but every few seconds the announcer was commenting on heavy hits or someone breaking as a jammer. Unfortunately there was a pause in the game when Blochness Monster took a fall that jostled her kneecap. Being down such a great skater, Serial Thrillers still took the lead and won by 1 point. I'm forgetting the final score, but I believe it was 28-27. With a score that never even broke 30 points each team, you know there was awesome defense played by both! After a halftime break, Serial Thrillers went up against my team, the Sunnyland Slammers. All of the teams have new girls that haven't played a game outside of a few scrimmages. Sunnyland is the freshest team, but that didn't stop us from maintaining a leading position for the majority of the game. My new girls really showed their hard work- all of the outside practices we'd been doubling up on, the teambuilding, and the strategy- and skated against some of the fiercest girls on the league led by league coach Anita Priest. Serial lost captain Tiger Beatdown to an injury in the last half. I even took a Chuck Norris-style fall into the crowd. But again both scores reflected the intensity of the game, eventually ending at 29-25 in favor of Serial in the last 3 jams. I couldn't be happier. To know that my batch of fresh meat held their own and skated so well up until the very end was reassuring that all of the stress of the last few weeks wasn't in vain. Anita came over and hugged every single Slammer, and thanked us for a clean game with great sportsmanship towards our fellow skaters and refs. Even though they had lost, every single Slammer went home beaming, as any derby girl worth their skates should.
