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The No. 2 Denver Bulldogs (9-1) won the 2007 Coopers USFooty
National Championship. Defeating No. 1 San Diego Lions (9-1) by just 6
points. It was a beautiful day for footy in Louisville's Champions
Park. Bright and sunny with little breeze and temperatures in the 80s.
Very warm for mid-October in the mid-West. The pitch was flat but dusty
as Kentucky's blue grass hasn't seen water in a very long time.
The
No. 1 San Diego Lions made it to the Grand Final by easily accounting
for the No. 4 New York Magpies, while the No. 2 Denver Bulldogs easily
accounted for the No. 3 Baltimore Washington Eagles. As befitting a
Grand Final, the pre-game ceremonies included national anthems
from the USA, Australia and Canada. In the commentary box were Rod
"Grilla" Grljusich and AFL Fullback of the Century Steven "SOS"
Silvagni giving special comments.
At the bounce, San Diego game
out hard and were dominant all over the ground. Despite the great
defense from Denver Coach Tom Ellis and former Revo Jim Baldwin, San
Diego was able to put on two goals and take a solid lead in a short
(two-twenty minute half) game. JJ Cisneros was great up forward and the
Lions were doing well with their leaders Jake Cameron and Adam Cannane
and Brendan McDonald. In defense, the Lions were completely stopping
big Denver Full Forward Matt Daniuski. The Lions went into half with
two goals on the board but a solid lead. But things had started to
change towards the end of the first half. According to Denver's Tom
Ellis, "you could start to feel a difference in the attitude of the
players." Things certainly turned around in the second half. Early on,
Daniuski went out with a leg injury, but the new forward line was able
to cobble together a goal from sheer will.
Denver's All-Star utility,
and new USFooty President Rich Mann started to put his stamp on the
game. The Denver boys started getting first to the contest and moving
the ball. Rich snapped an amazing goal to give Denver a 5 point lead.
Denver was again able to get the ball into the forward line and into
the every capable hands of Matt Daniuski. Unfortunately, Big Matt's
kick went over the post giving the Bulldogs a 6 point lead in the dying
minutes. At the siren the San Diego Lions marked but it was too far out
to score. It was a very exciting, very hard game of footy that saw the
Denver Bulldogs give the Lions their first loss in 2007 and win the
2007 USFooty National Championship 3.3 (21) to 2.3 (15).
After
the game, Tom Ellis was awarded with the John Harrell Memorial Cup
making him the first American to coach a National Championship team.
Tommy said that it was a great game put up by the San Diego boys and
there was just a lucky bounce between the two teams. It is hoped that
2008 will see the teams battle in a full-length game sometime during
the year.
The No. 9 Minnesota Freeze won the Division 2
National Championship over the No 10. Seattle Grizzlies. The Freeze
were led by another American coach, Revolution Assistant Jason Becker.
Jason also led on the field winning a best on ground performance in the
tournament and the in the Grand Final. One of the truly exciting things
about the performance of the Freeze was that 9 members of the team came
through the exchange program between St John's University in Minnesota
and the University of Notre Dame in Perth WA. USFooty's Executive
Director of the Australian Advisory Board, Tony Fairhead organized a
program in which American exchange students go through a footy bootcamp
put on by a number of clubs in Perth. The last year also saw a couple
of the players travel into WA's country leagues to play footy on the
weekend. Tony's efforts truly paid off with a fabulous effort by the
Freeze.
The St Louis Blues won Division 3, the Denver Bulldogs Reserves
won the reserves competition and the Atlanta Lady Kookaburras Threepeated for the Women's National Championship.The Baltimore-Washington Eagles finished an impressive season with third in the Poll. The Eagles finished second in pool play at Nationals after losing to the eventual champions, the Denver Bulldogs. On the other side, the No. 4 New York Magpies finished second in pool play after losing to the San Diego Lions. The two teams finishing third in pool play, the Golden Gate Roos and the Orange County Bombers, finished No. 5 and No. 6 respectively.
The other team that had a very impressive 2007 was the No. 7 Minnesota Freeze. Minnesota finished 2006 losing to the Baltimore Washington Eagles in the Division II Grand Final. In 2007 they improved to their No. 7 position with an impressive performance at Nationals including a hard fought win over the No. 9 Seattle Grizzlies, taking out the Division II National Championship. The Boston Demons and Chicago United both had a disappointing tournament finishing fourth in pool play but staying in the top 10 with position No. 8 and No. 10 respectively.
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