Wilmington Heading to Nationals Again

Derrick and I traveled up to Axton, VA on Sunday to watch Jack's team compete in Regionals. Wilmington was top seed going in and this was the tournament that would determine if they would make it to Nationals for the third time in a row. I was telling Jack that most teams never make it to regionals. I never went in college and Derrick only made it once. It's pretty neat to be a part of a team where Nationals is the expectation, not the goal.

The weather was not great....cold and wet, although the rain did hold off most of the time and it did start to warm up in the afternoon. We watched Wilmington win their first two games against William and Mary and Virginia. Those wins locked them into a nationals spot and they finished the day in finals against UNC.

Matt and Jack have been best friends since elementary school. It's been fun to watch them grow up together and now they both play on the team.

Jack borrowed some layers from a teammate so he humored me with an action shot.

Dad met us there to watch too.

The game against UNC did not go has desired. Wilmington had just beaten UNC two weeks early at sectionals but did not come out playing their strongest game on Sunday. UNC was playing very well and ended up beating Wilmington pretty handily. It was a frustrating game to watch and an even more frustrating game to play, I'm sure. I've never seen Jack look that mad after any game before...and I've watched him in a lot of sports.

Despite the loss I still think Jack played great. You could tell that he was not happy with the score but he didn't let that keep him from playing his game and fighting.  Ultiworld is a ultimate website that does recaps, previews, and discussions of big tournaments. They had a preview article about this tournament and a recap afterwards. Jack's been mentioned on Ultiworld a lot in his short ultimate career but I think this article had my favorite quote about him so far:  "Williams was still brilliant, fighting through to the last point and emerging perhaps as the Seamen's most fearsome competitor."

That's so true! He's a team player and he plays every single point without focusing on the score. He wants to earn every point. We're all super proud of him and of Wilmington! Unfortunately Derrick and I won't be able to go to Nationals but I'm already crossing my fingers for another quarters/semi-final/finals appearance so we can watch him on ESPN again this year!