Calamity Janes narrowly defeated by Providence Killah Bees, 61-63
June 7, 2008
The derby fans at the Portland Expo were treated to an edge-of-the-seat, bite-the- nails-to-the-quick game when the Maine Roller Derby Calamity Janes and the Providence Killah Bees took to the track on Saturday, June 7th. The game ended in a whirlwind of two furious – and ultimately confusing – overtime jams that had fans and skaters alike whipped into a frenzy.
This was the first bout for the Calamity Janes, Maine’s junior varsity team, and the Killah Bees are a relatively new team for Providence Roller Derby as well. The Janes’ initial nerves were clear in the first jam when they struggled with trying to crack the Bees’ three-skater wall as Bee jammer Jetta Von Diesel quickly gained lead and scored two grandslams, while the Janes’ jammer Trouble & Strife was not able to break the pack. From there the Janes quickly turned their jitters around and held the Bees scoreless in the next six jams. In jam six Janes’ jammer Tinker Tank risked the outside corner on her first pass and hopped around a big hit to land lead jammer, and then went on to score 4 while the Bees’ Barbie Biturate was stuck in the pack behind Janes blockers A-Block and Roxxy Retribution. By the time the whistle blew in jam seven, the Janes were leading with a score of 25-10. But the last three jams of the period saw the Bees starting to turn it around, and despite some solid offensive blocking by the Janes’ Jenni-vicious the Bees earned lead and held the Janes scoreless for the last three jams, ending the first period with only a six point deficit, 25-19.
The Bees continued their upswing in the start of the second period when the Janes’ jammer Maulie MacKillem was inches away from lead status, but hit the floor at the last second and got sucked back into the fray. Fo’ Shizzy Borden then zipped through for lead and the Bees held Maulie in the pack while Shizzy skated a double-grandslam and put the Bees in the lead 25 – 29. The next several jams traded a tight lead back and forth, with Itsy Bitsy Fighter of the Janes scoring a smooth 5 in jam two, and then the Bees coming back in the third jam when Jetta Von Diesel took out Janes’ jammer Maulie MacKillem, allowing Fo’ Shizzy to score three and take the lead 32-30. But the next jam put the Janes back in a slim lead, and they stayed there for the rest of the period, ending at 49 – 35.
Third period once again started with some solid scoring jams by the Bees. The home crowd cheered as Jenni-vicious of the Janes took out jammer Jetta Von Diesel, but that didn’t stop Jetta from recovering and scoring a grandslam before the whistle blew. The next jam had the crowd moaning as Shelby Bruisin’ ruthlessly battered Janes’ jammer Tinker Tank, knocking her down twice and helping the Bees to a 6-0 jam. The Bees’ smart pack control was a factor in getting their jammer through a number of times, and they held the Janes at 57 while they while they slowly picked away at their deficit. Jam ten saw Fo Shizzy’ Borden knock down Janes jammer Itsy Bitsy Fighter, allowing Jetta Von Diesel to score 2 and bring the score even at 57-57 before Jenni-vicious cleaned her out. With only 23 seconds left on the clock, neither team was able to score any more points in the final jam and the game went into overtime.
Both teams sent out their star jammers of the night – Itsy Bitsy Fighter for the Janes and Jetta Von Diesel (also a notable blocker) for the Bees. Both teams scored 4 on the first pass but got sucked back into the pack. After much struggle Jetta broke free first and lapped around to score two more points, with Fighter approaching the pack for her second scoring pass. With just 17 seconds left, Shelby Bruisin’ was knocked into the stands and the jam was called due to injury. After a long pause for referee review of the rules, which did not clearly address situations when an overtime jam does not go the full two minutes, the points from the previous jam were scrapped and both teams hit the track for one more overtime jam. Fighter and Jetta toed the jammer line once again, and the crowd was on its feet. Both jammers scored 4 hard-earned points on their first pass, but as Jetta tried to make it out of the front of the pack Wrex Zilla came out of nowhere and knocked her down, forcing her to fight her way back through the pack again. This allowed Fighter to lap around and score another 4 before the buzzer sounded, with the crowd on its feet and screaming the whole way.
The final scoreboard showed 61 – 57 with a win for the Janes, but the win was later amended to have been for the Bees, the confusion having been due to the lack of clarity in the rules regarding overtime jams. The final official score was 61 – 63 in the Bees’ favor, due to a ref scoring decision made between the two overtime jams that was not communicated to the audience and teams until after the game. Despite the disappointing confusion, fans and skaters alike agreed it was one of, if not the most exciting game they’d ever seen or played.
The evening saw notable jamming by Maulie MacKillem and particularly Itsy Bitsy Fighter, who was awarded MVP for the Janes and scored an unbelievable 37 out of the 61 points. The Bees hammered out a number of bruising jammer takedowns, particularly by Violent Vixxen, who was voted Bees’ MVP, as well as by Jetta Von Diesel and Barbie Biturate. The event was rounded out by the robotic-dance sounds of Feel It Robot, and as always the stellar bout music by We Push Buttons.
