To Parents, Friends, and Alums of Brownian Motion-

Last weekend, Brown participated in the annual Stanford Invite. To call it as such is misleading because in truth we played our six games in the Central Valley on account of heavy rains in Palo Alto.

Our first game was against Claremont. Claremont entered the Stanford Invite after promising results at the Trouble in Vegas tournament and an undefeated run at the Stanford Invite Qualifier. Our young team came out to play but the strong wind and deep game of Claremont were immediately barriers to BMo’s first win of the season. Claremont went up early and never looked back. Claremont 15, Brown 6.

Our next game was against Queens-Kingston. You may remember Queens as the most hyped team at Nationals last year after recording an undefeated record out of the Metro East. In the end, Queens finished tied for last. Nonetheless, Queens ran hard on D and played a quick and exciting form of offense that was difficult to handle. After BMo took a 4-2 lead, Queens stepped it up and took half, 8-5. In the second half, Brown and Queens traded points, and the game was capped at 12-8, Queens.

Our last game on Saturday was against 21-0 Florida. As you can imagine, Florida has had ample time to work on its zone, and bring zone they did. Our zone offense was ably led by a combination of Mike Pozar ’05 GS ’06, Mike Vandenberg ’08, Jimmy Lowe ’08, and Dave Erickson GS. None of these handlers are strangers to a good zone D, and they did well in the gusty wind of the Central Valley. Also deserving mention was the awesome “cup” component of our zone defense, with freshmen Andy Miller ’09 and Jeff Ericson ’09 on the marks and big Ben Saper ’07 at middle-middle. This trio cost Florida more than a few turnovers. In the end, though, Florida’s synchrony and flow, a product of 20+ games already played this season, were too strong for us. Florida 15, Brown 5.

Saturday night found BMo in the magical vacation destination that is Modesto, CA. The mood of the team was certainly upbeat- for the new guys, they had gotten a taste for what college ultimate is all about; for the vets, we knew what we had to work on, and we knew we were getting better as a team. After a delicious (read: sub-par) meal at the DeChina Buffet, Brown hit the sack early at the Heritage Inn. A big day was ahead.

BMo left Modesto early Sunday morning and drove for about an hour and a half into the countryside. We would be joining the women’s half of tournament at the Central Valley Polo Club.

Our first game was against Cal-Berkeley. Cal is coming off a tough rebuilding season last year and their early results this season are a mix of highs and lows. We knew that Cal was going to be better than either Claremont or Queens, and that we needed to come out strong as a team in order to guarantee some more games on Sunday.

The game was, from the start, at a much higher level of intensity than any of our three previous games. After a couple of breaks went in Cal’s direction, Cal took half, 7-3. Coaches Paul Vandenberg ’05 and Josh Ziperstein ’05 focused the team at half time, reminding us of the tenets of Brown Ultimate. Veteran studs and captains, Reid Hopkins ’06 and Colin Mahoney ’07, led the way to a strong start to the second half. Before long, BMo was back in the game. With the game on the line and a deep huck thrown to an open cutter, Reid Hopkins ’06 left his man in a mad dash to the Cal endzone. “Hop” caught up with the disc for one of the sweetest Ds the Central Valley had ever seen. Later on, with the game at 8s, Brown worked the disc to midfield with relative ease. Those on the sidelines were aware that the game might be hard capped at any time. At Stall 8, Mike Vandenberg ’08 threw a downwind bomb in either a stroke of genius or an attempt to punt the disc. Jimmy Lowe ’08! , Mike’s boy from Paideia days, kicked it into high gear and managed to 1) catch up to the disc and 2) get position on his defender. As soon as Jimmy had made this ridiculous catch, the game was called: BMo had earned its first victory of the season. How exciting?!

Our next two games were against Oregon and UCSD. Oregon was a pretty solid team, and like the Cal game, BMo found itself down 7-3 at half. Our Zone O proved its mettle yet again, and carried us back into striking distance with some old school chilly O. Also of note was Colin Mahoney’s utter dominance of Oregon’s go-to guy, with multitudinous Ds and count ‘em six goals. Unfortunately, time was not in our favor in this game, and we ultimately lost 11-9. Against UCSD, BMo stumbled upon its first halftime lead, 7-5. Matt Canale RISD ’06 made what was easily the catch of the game, when he came down with a swilly hammer thrown upwind and into the vicinity of about ten players. Seconds later, Matt cut for the score. What a sequence? In the end, UCSD converted a couple more plays then we did, and won by a narrow margin. All in all, it was a weekend of successes, no matter what the score-line will tell you. We saw quality play from ALL players on the team and we also proved that the potential is there for a great season. Deserving mention, also, was Jimmy Lowe- for Jimmy had his breakout tournament with 12 Ds on top of excellent contributions at handler. Our Sunday performance was almost twice as good as our Saturday performance- one can only imagine what future tournaments will bring. If there is one thing clear after this past weekend it is this: Brown will be back, and if you think otherwise, just try to beat us in May.

We will be at Centex in two weeks. For now, we'll be outside practicing in the spring-like weather. Hope it will last.

Best,
Jon