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Kim Winheim
Radical Andrew Meshick helps defeat the Pittsburgh Thunderbirds on June 4.
Early into the Madison Radicals season, when Bill Everhart told me the city’s professional ultimate disc team expected to win the 2016 American Ultimate Disc League title, it was easy to view his words as a confident and intimidating boast from a guy on one of the most experienced and toughest teams in the country.
But now it’s beginning to look as if Everhart’s prediction was right on target.
The Radicals moved to 8-0 on the season after dismissing the Pittsburgh Thunderbirds, 23-16, on June 4 at Breese Stevens Field in what many players and fans considered to be Madison’s biggest challenge of the year.
The victory also improved the Radicals’ winning streak at home to 28 games. A record (and boisterous) crowd of 1,212 fans packed the stands, and the action was streamed live on ESPN3.
The Radicals have now defeated Pittsburgh, the closest thing to a full-blown rivalry in the AUDL’s Midwest Division, twice this season. And with five games remaining, it’s time to start thinking that not only will Madison host the AUDL’s Championship Weekend V on Aug. 6 and 7 at Breese Stevens, but that the Radicals also could win the whole thing.
Madison has made the AUDL’s final four in three of the team’s four seasons of existence, and the Radicals finished 13-1 last year, coming within two points of winning the 2015 AUDL title in San Jose, Calif. No wonder several hundred local fans already have purchased their tickets for championship weekend, which will feature the best teams from each of the league’s four divisions competing in a playoff format. All three games will be live-streamed on ESPN3.
Several Radicals stepped up against Pittsburgh. Jay Froude, who travels 475 miles from Kansas City, Mo., to play in Madison, broke up a scoring play that would have tied the game 6-6 in the second quarter. The Thunderbirds never caught up after that.
Whenever they came close, another Radical — Tom Annen, Pat Shriwise, Seth Meyer and Andrew Meshnick, among them — would step in for the score or a key defensive stop.
The Radicals will go for their ninth win of the season and 29th in a row at Breese Stevens on Saturday, June 11, at 6 p.m. against the 4-5 Detroit Mechanix and then return home for the final regular-season game against the Indianapolis Alleycats on July 10.
The Radicals hope their season will be far from over, though.