Saturday, May 20, 2017

Wäsby Warriors Spring Party 2017 Was a Loooooooong Day of American Football Happiness


Saturday, 20 May, 2017:

Before I start the saga of the Annual Wäsby Warriors Spring Party, the brainchild of our own Aiki Parts, I must remind you that there are now only . . .

 . . . more wake-ups until . . .

. . . this goofy looking
couple is reunited!

A late addition from Friday night

After our U15 walk-through practice on Friday night, we met at the stadium at Vilundaparken to do some last second preparations for Saturday's big American football day.

Afterwards we met at Aiki's house for some pizza and camaraderie with, from left to right, Jesper, Lovisa, me and Aiki. Lotta took the photo.

Good Times Indeed!

 After months of planning,
it was finally time

The Spring Party is the Warriors
showcase that includes tryouts,
merchandise sales, food, fika and
lots and lots of American football

7:30 A.M.

Our day started with breakfast at the Scandic Hotel in nearby Infracity.

 The hotel's atrium was nice

The breakfast buffet was better!

The key to survival in any
Fika rich country

By 8:30 we were at the stadium

The crew working the concessions booth were already hard at work! 

 The information flyers were ready
for distribution

THE most important sign
at Vilundaparken Stadium

Fields set-up for the 7-man
U11 games

Impromptu and entertaining U11
pre-game warm-up ritual 

And another

Left unsupervised because the U11s were arriving well before the announced meeting time, they were inventive with their opportunity for some good old fashioned mild mischief.

11:00 A.M.

It was U11 GAME TIME!

Our three U11 squads, the Steelers, Packers and Vikings, would go up against their counterparts from the Sollentuna Stars program, the Redskins, Chargers and Saints.

All six teams would get to play two short games today.

The coaches were ready!

The players were ready . . . 

. . . Game Face ready!

The Refs were ready

Even international ref Rodrigo
from Chile was on hand to instruct
our young refs

 The Balloon Arch was ready

The Cheerleaders were ready

The Bounce House was not ready

Yet.

Here come our U11s!

 Unique pass rush stance combined
with Packer helmets on Steelers
players caused maximum confusion
to the Saints O-Line blocking schemes

HUGE Chargers QB

Viking pressuring the Chargers QB

Violence was in the air

 Our Viking RB is a serious TD threat
every time he touches the ball

Hey, the Bounce House IS ready!

 Good open field tackle

We really need to
address our stances

Steeler back on a . . .

 . . . BREAKAWAY RUN!

 Interception Steelers!

Viking QB Sack

Coach Dan Pettersson and
our beloved Vikings

Aiki Parts relaxing a bit
with our young ref

 TD Machine

 It is NOT a contact sport,
it is a COLLISION sport!

 The Packers can run the rock too!

Scanning the field

 QB needs to carry out his fake

Another Packers RB is loose

Happy to see that no U11 player
was in it during their games

 A rare U11 pass

#50 has wheels!

The Pit
Packers-Chargers style

I think that the U11 coaches were quite pleased with our club's efforts today.

My biggest take-away was that all three teams are loaded with backs that have a good combination of speed, toughness and cutting ability. These attributes were not plentiful at this level last Spring.

Also, the teams were opportunistic on defense with several take-aways with at least two of them going for defensive TDs!

GREAT effort U11s!

Fika Time between the
U11 and U13 games

It was a moral imperative.

1:30 P.M.

Time for our nine-man U13 game as the Warriors also took on the Sollentuna Stars.

U13s warming-up

A sassy Aiki Parts

Many believe that she may have
been an arsonist back in her
home country of Estonia

But not me.

 She was just adding ambience
to the Warriors . . .

. . . Balloon Arch

Cheerleader Run-Through Tunnel

Young coaches still jog
onto the field

Old coaches not so much.

Fire Up U13s!

 Cheerleaders flying

DE making a good tackle

See the ball . . .

. . . tackle the ball carrier!

J.J. Watt Swedish style

 Turning the corner

Six of the nine Warrior
defenders swarming to the ball

QB, this could hurt

 Good pass protection for
the Warriors QB

The U13 Pit

 The name of the game is
"Pressuring the QB"

Gang tackling U13s

A Warriors RB
running with good vision

Pursuit!

The U13 game ended in a 12-12 tie. We did lots of good things but also have many things to still improve upon.

Good effort U13s!

How could I pass up on
Korv m. bröd for only 10 Krona?

I simply could not, it was just too attractive a deal for me to offer any resistance.

3:00 P.M.

Now it was time for our eleven-man U15 game against Stockholm's Djurgården IF, no nickname.

Since this is the club that I coach directly, I put my Nikon camera away and hope to post good photos that others took in the next few days.

Of course, my iPhone camera was still at the ready for a few candid shots.

Head Coach Jimmy Alonso
leading the U15s out

I thought that he did a marvelous job today leading our troops during the contest.

#77 Liam
Hit-of-the Game Award

Liam plays both Offensive Tackle and Defensive End for us.

We threw an interception in the second half that the Djurgården player returned up our sideline. Liam sprinted with a perfect angle of pursuit and delivered a clean, well timed hit to the ball thief that got everybody in red excited beyond belief.

DEFINITE HAMMER HIT
DECAL EFFORT!

Jimmy's final words to the team
Our emergency QB, #3, Joel
would have a BIG day!

I liked our new U15 jerseys that are thanks to Doug Dagan of Camarillo, California's Dagan Sales and Marketing.

They also made all of our new U11 jerseys as well.

 Warriors Motto Today:
"Bombs Away!"

Djurgården surprised us with a successful onside kick to start the game. Our boys did not panic and the defense put out the fire.

We have no last names in Sweden as this game scoring summary will attest.

In the first quarter, we took an early 8-0 lead thanks to an 80 yard Td pass play from Joel to Linus. Linus also caught Joel's 2 point-PAT pass.

In the second period, the Wäsby eleven padded their lead with another bomb, this time a 55 yard aerial affair from Joel to Lucas. The 2 point-PAT run was no good, Warriors 14 - Djurgården 0.

The Warrior defense got into the scoring column seconds before the half time break as Mio and Lucas combined to tackle a Djurgården RB in the end zone for a safety!

At the half, it was Warriors 16 - Djurgården 0.

Joel had a 15 yard scoring run in the third period and his pass to Linus was good for another two points. After three quarters the Warriors were in complete command of the game. The score was Wäsby 24 - Djurgården 0.

The fourth quarter saw the Warriors tally one last time as Joel threw his third TD pass of the contest, this time from 15 yards out again to his favorite, big play target Linus. Joel also ran the ball in for the final two points of the game.

Final Score: Wäsby 32 - Djurgården 0.

In case you were wondering, we have not practiced PAT or Field Goal kicking at all, hence the two point play mania.

As I said at the start of this game's post, Joel was our emergency QB. The original starter has not practiced since I've been here due to a concussion.

Can you say Wally Pipp?

Djurgården during the traditional
Swedish post-game ritual

Warriors responding in the
post-game thank you too

6:00 P.M.

The final event of the day was a Division I Norra Senior match between the Arlanda Jets and Djurgården.

Our Game Announcer
was Knute

Again, no last name.

I would watch the game from the booth seated next to fun loving Knute, serving as his defensive spotter alerting him to who made the tackle on the play.

I had fun and he made the game fun to watch for the fans and me!

Djurgården Seniors

The Arlanda Jets in Orange

 Arlanda's punishing ground game

The Jets improved to 2-1 via a 44-14 entertaining shellacking of Djurgården. It was Djurgården's first loss in 2017, they are also 2-1 now.

9:10 P.M.

I arrived home after helping with cleaning up the stadium and putting equipment away.

Aiki and her Crew of workers should be extremely happy with how things went today in my opinion!

It was a long day of American football as expected, but it was also . . .

"A GREAT DAY FOR
AMERICAN FOOTBALL!"

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