First off these guys are entertaining. I wanted to continue my collection of objective ultimate material with who I believe to be the #2 team in the country right now and these guys crack me up. I got a hold of Patrick Baylis, Carleton's captain, and he answered some questions of mine and I thought I would share them with you.
Player Departures
Jacob Goldstein seems to be the biggest name that is not coming back to Carleton this year. I am a big fan of this kid because he gives hope to the stockier players out there. In watching him at college nationals and club regionals this past year, I was very surprised at how well he plays D despite the fact that he isn't the standard 6'2" 160 lbs twig that many elite disc players are now a days. Two other names that aren't returning are Keith Christianson, a spectacular down field defender and Craig Hogle, one of CUTs veteran handlers.
Talent for 2008
Despite player departures, Carleton still has a very young crop of players. I went back and watched what I believed to be the best game at college nationals last year (Stanford vs CUT) and most of the guys making plays will be suiting up for CUT this year. One of the bigger stars will probably be Sam Kanner (sophmore #33). This kid lined up against Robbie Cahill and Mark Sherwood a lot in that game and his fellow head band wearing team mate, Jerome Potter (junior #11), was also in that mix. These two heavy hitters, as well as Baylis, all played for Sub Zero this past year and are definitely ready to break some hearts. It is also worth mentioning that Kanner was on the juniors team USA that won gold in 2006 and runs track at Carleton, yikes. Another club player that has definitely picked up some experience over the last two years is Adam Fagin (sophmore #6) who suited up for Mischief the last two years. All in all, the best of Carleton is still very much a part of the team and will definitely have the ability to break into games late on saturday at nationals.
Tournament Schedule
Carleton has signed on for the CCS and will be attending Vegas, Stanford, and Centex in addition to the series. I suppose these 3 tournies are the best out there but I wonder if CUT would benefit from another tournament in that mix. Stanford goes to Santa Barbara, Wisconsin goes to Mardi Gras, Florida has their Winter Classic, etc... I am sure that this team will be focused and ready, however, and I think that the annual regional match up with the Hodags will continually be as exciting as ever. I asked Baylis to give me some thoughts on Wisconsin and this is what he told me:
"Nobody knows this, but the way Wisconsin plays defense is particularly vulnerable to the now-forgotten “Trident Stack” popular in the ’80s. We have revived that offense and added a top-secret wrinkle, called The Reversal, which eliminates the primary weakness of the flip-side poach draw without requiring the handler to scuttle his D1 and D4 options so early in the count. This really opens up the inside flick dump to the broadside hucker coming across for E2. And of course, our failsafe is still flying in on the diagonal to bring down the easy crabwise floater. As far as we can tell, it can’t be beaten. And we haven’t even mentioned our defense (nor will we)."
Hilarious, I love the spittle.
Goals and Expectations
Not surprisingly, Baylis and CUT are true competitors. When I asked him what his goals were for the season he told me "Three wins on Friday, two on Saturday, one on Sunday". You gotta love the black and white intensity. What I think is interesting is that they seem to focus their attention on nationals where as Wisconsin seems to focus on winning the region. I suppose there are different ways at looking at the same sets of goals. In any event, I think CUT will definitely have what it takes to make a run at the golden disc. They have the talent (which is now more experienced) and definitely have some painful memories, Phill Vozza's (Florida #26) layout D in quarters, the double game point loss to Stanford, and the JoJah upset, to motivate them to condition, improve, and stay focused. I am excited to see what they'll do especially at Centex when they will face their toughest competition until Regionals.
College Nationals
I was also curious to know how CUT felt about the new change in when nationals will be played. This is what Baylis had to say:
"We’ll see how it goes this year. We wish it wasn’t two weeks earlier because it limits our outside practice time even more than usual, but as far as the event itself goes we don’t really know what to expect."
Closing thoughts
I definitely think that CUT can give Wisconsin a run this year. They have a Fall tournament win over the Hodags, which Baylis says was no big deal, but I think it still gives CUT the notion that Wisconsin is not invincible. CUT has nothing to lose and everything to gain and the Hodags are not in that boat anymore. I think the best disc is played when players are truly motivated. Nothing can replace that sense of focus on offense and that intensity on D. One final question that I had for Baylis that I think most people are curious about is, how CUT continually manages to stay at the top of the ultimate community despite being a really small school? Baylis said that it's all about "Heart. (And Earth, Fire, Wind, and Water)". Ha, I love it. Thanks for being entertaining and good luck.
just my thoughts
match diesel
16 comments:
I'm afraid that you will be known as the Dicky V of college ultimate after your Stanford preview.
THATS AWESOME BABY!!!
Can you start doing your analysis in the 2nd person, Hubie Brown style? Everyone loves Hubie.
Joel Silver interview any time soon?
Carleton does have tons and tons of juniors players funneling in, which counteracts its small size.
that is an added bonus but I am not entirely convinced that the best juniors players make the best college players. For every Jolian Dahl or Alex Nord there is a Dan Heijman, Richter or Ben Wiggins. I think being a juniors all star helps but a good program can turn a committed athlete into an ultimate superstar. And there are Junior players that don't continue to improve in college programs.
Then again, maybe I am just biased because UCSD never really had all that many junior players so I figured the initial experience was marginal. I will admit that I could be wrong though.
Hey Cut, nationals is only one week earlier.
As for the Juniors thing, I think you are right match. How many Amherst players have won college nationals? Zip is among the few.
I (obviously) disagree about the HS player issue. Yes Amherst players haven't until recently made a big impact, but that was because so many of them stopped playing (some didn't go to college, others were burnt out, some quit when they realized the college team wasn't as good or serious as their high school team). Also, historically, much of Amherst's success comes from *team* fundamentals and mental game. While their individual skills and athleticism are above average for HS their team, not individual, focus is what sets Amherst apart. In many ways Zip is the exception that proves the Amherst rule - he did not play in high school until his senior year.
More recently Amherst players have had great success at the national level, at least four have won college championships (David Kroodsma (2002), Nick Reich (2001), Zip and Mike Pozar (2005). But the impact of players like Kanner, Sam Roberts, Christian Foster (all Carleton), and Will Neff (Michigan) is huge.
But look at the other top HS programs and you'll see an even bigger impact. Several Paideia players have gone on to be leaders or play makers on college champions or near college champions (Moses, Harper Alexander, Adam Simon, Will Arnold, Paul Vandenberg, Jolian Dahl, Dylan Tunnel to name only a few). Likewise NOMS/MoHo has further shown the impact of High School play on the college division (Nord, Chase, C-K, Jeremy Cram and more). Shoot half of Sockeye came from the same youth Ultimate program in Seattle and half of Chain came from the same high school program in Atlanta. I've said it before, but great HS players are not only becoming great college players, but also great club players.
Northfield Mount Hermon produced Jacob Goldstein and the Mahoney brothers as well as Rusty Ingold Smith who is leading UNCW back into Nationals contention.
UofO/Rhino is stocking up on S. Eugene players one of the up and coming high school programs.
There is simply no way that Carleton and to a slightly lesser extent Brown could be perennial Nationals teams and title contenders if it weren't for high school Ultimate. The schools aren't big enough for them to recruit enough top tier athletes.
What would really drive this point home is if you lined up Carleton and compared to any other top college team in the country. The players, especially the big name players, are generally smaller but considerably more skilled and knowledgeable due to having played for so much longer at a high level. Without the large number of good high school players over the past 10 years Carleton would be Oberlin.
As an aside, if anyone wants to know how to play great Ultimate even if you aren't 6'2" and a great (for Ultimate) athlete you should watch Carleton this season. If our most athletic teams had these skills and understood the game like them the sport would take a huge step forward.
Sorry this got long. I should just start my own blog.
Also, when a high school player gets to college with 2 years of club nationals experience as a starter for a team that made semis then quarters in the open division, their impact should be even more immediate. Which will be fun to track this year as Grant Lindsley joins Carleton and George Stubbs joins Harvard after Paideia and 3/2 years on chain, respectively.
I read your whole post Kyle waiting for you to mention it...
"...but the impact of players like Kanner, Sam Roberts, Christian Foster (all Carleton)..."
...also senior Gabe Hart and freshman Patrick Roberts are from Amherst.
Completely agree with Kyle. He fails to harp long enough for my liking, though, on how unlikely the ridiculous Carleton juniors line is. Surely there's been nothing like it before. Four Junior World's players from the same year on one team, along with some great players who weren't on Worlds but did play for Amherst, Team Ill, etc.
Also, I thought that Jason Simpson was also a Paideia alum.
Junior players are very important, but you need depth. And I am not sure there is a college team with 16+ junior players.
It has definitely made a turn to where teams can get a line (or close to a line) of junior players out there. But with tourneys being so brutal, your roster needs to be 18, so you have to be able to recruit athletes at college as well.
Part of the slight (most programs would be very happy with the success of CUT over the past 6 years, so I do not mean this as a shot) decline by CUT a couple years ago was the fact they were unable to get the other athletes at college. The guys who did not play disc in high school, but other sports. They came to college looking to play something else and found ultimate. And here is where Madison has really excelled. They have some juniors players, but use their inherent advantage as a Big 10 school to get a ton of athletes just to tryout. And then pick and choose from there.
Juniors coming in are very big assets. Especially now since they are actually athletic as opposed to the dorks they used to be. But even with the influx of juniors talent, you HAVE to be able to convince the other kids to play too. At the very least to add depth. And hopefully, you can get those kids to turn into something great.
Tim,
I don't disagree with you. I think Carleton is probably near 14 former HS players. I think we both agree that if they didn't have the huge HS pipeline they would not be anywhere near the top tier. With that pipeline, Carleton can be competitive with 1/10th or 20th the student body that many of these universities have.
Ultimate Fan,
Yes Jason is another Paideia Alum, he was just not a big college name (also Josh Markette is one of the best unknown players out there - starting O line for Chain). You can see the Paideia alum in action at Poultry Days this summer.
Skidmore,
I wouldn't put Gabe or Patrick in the tier of impact players Kanner, Sam Bob, and Christian, but yes, there are a lot of former Amherst players at Carleton.
can you explain the trident stack at all? where it came from, how it runs?
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