written by Leet

Formerly known as SoCal Warm-Up, the UCSD Psychos renamed their fall quarter tournament in honor of late teammate and friend, Kendra "Punnett" Fallon. A huge thanks goes out to all the volunteers who helped with the tournament, along with VC Ultimate for all their support and their help in raising $274 which will be donated to the SKY Memorial Foundation.

Split into two teams, the Kendra Fallon Tournament was a weekend for all of the SoCal teams and the Psychos to have one final warm-up before the season. The X Team faced Claremont in their first game, a team also split into two. Against a familiar opponent, the returning Psychos matched up with their stronger handlers and the rookies were matched up fairly against the other team. With great handler defense, the Psychos were able to shut down Claremont’s offensive plays and turn around for the score with many rookies eager to run down to the endzone taking the game 12-11.

With no byes during this tournament, Team X went straight into their next game against Arizona. The opponents played a very fast paced game, transitioning quickly from turn to huck for the score. Though the Psychos were mostly able to keep up with the speedy opponents, the Arizona players simply outran many of our players as poor defensive matchups led to a 5-12 loss.

Next up was Occidental, a fun and spirited team. The opponents had a very young team and mostly filtered their offense through experienced handlers. The Psychos matched up to shut down any handler give-and-go or long hucks to stall their game. There was also a rookie point as many of our younger teammates were excited to play against such a spirited team. The Psychos ended the game 7-4.

In the final game of the first day, the crossover match was played against San Diego State. The heat bore down as the competition fired up against our cross-city rivals. Unfortunately, the Psychos were not able to find their flow and broke down against the Gnomes quick handler movement and hucks. Though a tough fight, the Psychos lost 4-10.

Sunday of the KFal tournament started out rainy but it was new day of more playing for many of our rookies. In the first bracket, Psychos-X faced Claremont again but a more complete team as they combined their two teams into one in this final day of tournament. With more of their stronger players, Claremont was able to move the disc much more quickly. The Psychos stayed on par fighting point for point against Claremont but eventually lost their hold and was pushed out of the Championship bracket.

Instead of facing the counterpart Psychos in the second round, Psychos-X played Cal State Long Beach. Once again, it was another game of trading points but eventually, Long Beach averted any chances of a universal point and pulled away with great handler movement, essentially ending the game and the day for Psychos-X as they moved on to play Psychos-Y in the next round. Both Psychos fought through some difficult games the 2nd day and were able to come out of Kendra Fallon Memorial Tournament with some great new game-time experience for our new members. 

written by Leet
The annual Sean Ryan Memorial Tournament started out with us matched up against Humboldt for the first game.  Right off the bat, our team was aggressive taking initiative to move the disc quickly.  Humboldt kept up steadily as we continued to trade points back and forth but time was on our side as we took the game defeating the number one seed in our pool 9-8.

After a long break of two byes, our game against UC Santa Barbara was yet another fast paced game. The Psychos responded with great dump D, shutting down their handler offense set and preventing them from moving the disc.  There were some big plays, on both teams, but we were able to capitalize on turnovers. We answered back with many deep looks, as the wind began to pick up, which resulted in our 11-7 victory.

In our last game of the day, we faced Cal Poly SLO, a very familiar opponent.  Our rookies continued to improve and seemed to pick up the strategy of game play, coming up with a few D’s and great runs down in the endzone.  We had many miraculous grabs and had a final point with 5 of our rookies ending the day and game with a successful 12-11 score. With a 3-0 record on Saturday and coming out first in our pool, originally seeded 3rd and 10th overall, we would play in the championship bracket on Sunday.

Heading into the championship bracket Sunday morning, we found ourselves playing a very aggressive game against SDSU.  SDSU came out strong, scoring the first 2 points, but we continued to fight, scoring several points in a row. State came back to tie us and we continued trading points. The Psychos never let up and continued to push while playing aggressive defense. It was a very physical game but the Psychos still left the field proud even with an 11-13 loss.

Claremont was up next and the Psychos continued to be aggressive as we moved the disc really quickly, picking up the pace for every point.  Many of our deep shots connected and our D was solid but we allowed Claremont to catch up when our fast pace turned into too many throws to no one.  However, the Psychos were able to come up to win on universe with smart break cuts to the endzone.

The Psychos never let up even in the final game of the tournament against Sonoma State.  Also a very quick team with capable handlers, aggressive D was going to be main issue in this game.  It was a very tight game and even though we took half, our teams kept trading points all the way to universe.  Though it was a loss, our team came up with a lot of great grabs and great timing for deep cuts.  The tournament was a great indicator of how much our team could grow as we left Santa Cruz with a record of 4-2 and just a 3-point differential in our 2 losses.