Zion Curtain Ultimate (ZCU) is the U’s official ultimate Frisbee team. ZCU placed third in the Northwest Regional tournament earlier this month and secured a spot to play in the National Championship. This will be the first time a team from Utah, Wyoming, Idaho or Montana has ever competed at a national level. By earning a spot to compete at Nationals, Utah has proven themselves to be in the top 20 best teams out more than 400 ultimate teams in the country.
Utah stunned the Northwest region with their qualification for Nationals. Of the 10 teams invited to compete at the Northwest region, ZCU was seeded ninth, and their national ranking was 48. In order to earn a spot at Nationals, they were required to place third or higher. In the first round of the tournament, they beat Western Washington (nationally ranked 35), Whitman, and Montana State. During the second round, they had to beat University of British Colombia, who is nationally ranked 15, to ensure their third place spot and advance to Nationals. At the end of the game, the scoreboard read 15-13 Utah and ZCU had secured their spot to play at Nationals.
Although the team could not be more excited to take their first shot at playing at Nationals, that isn’t the only thing they are excited about. They hope that with a little bit of recognition and support, they can boost the knowledge of the program and increase the growth of the sport.
Securing a spot at Nationals is an unexpected dream come true for the team. When it comes to preparing for the highly competitive event, the team isn’t quite sure what to expect, which has made preparation somewhat of a challenge.
“We are still running hard, throwing daily, and doing everything we can to get better, but we have also taken some time to just enjoy the moment. Our goal for the year was to make it to the big dance, which we accomplished. This part of our journey has been extremely exciting and our team attitude right now is to keep putting in the work but, more importantly, enjoy the ride,” said Michael Affleck, who is a current team Captain.
Since ZCU was first started 10 years ago, they’ve consistently had talented players as well as opportunities to get as far as they are now. One of the main reasons this team was able to get so far this year compared with years past was organization. With a thorough and hard-working leadership group handling the administrative aspects of team management, the team as a whole was able to focus on the most crucial part of the game: playing well.
When ZCU is able to let loose, play their game and enjoy it, they are unstoppable.
In order to prepare themselves to play competitively at Nationals, their main focus will be “watching some of the other teams and picking out their strengths and weaknesses. This will allow them to go into each game knowing what match-ups they can exploit,” said Head Coach Joshua Letsinger.
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