Speed Kills
Bout recap by Phil Arnold

May 6, 2007

There’s an old saying in sports that “speed kills.” Houston Roller Derby brought an all-star team into Austin Sunday night and found out that speed kills from a team whose cheer is “Faster, Faster, Kill, Kill, Kill!” The Hotrod Honeys of the Texas Rollergirls beat the Houston HaRD Knocks 133-97 in a bout that featured fast, skilled jammers from both sides. In the second match of the evening, the Hell Marys stayed undefeated beating the defending champion Honky Tonk Heartbreakers, 97-31.

The Hotrod Honeys started off the first four jams of the night taking a 26-8 lead, but the HaRD Knocks would come back on an eight-point jam by Mistilla the Killa to give several hundred Houston fans a thrill and a brief 34-33 lead midway through the first half. From there however, the Honeys would outscore the Houston all stars 35-17 to take a 68-50 lead into the first thirty-minute period. Still the HaRD Knocks had shown they could skate with the Honeys, at least jammer for jammer.

However in second half the jammers for the Hotrods would put the pressure on the younger Houston team, and steadily draw the lead out to the final 36-point margin. Hotrod Honey jammer Rice Rocket skated an amazing game scoring 61 points. She gained lead jammer status all six times she jammed in the second half, and in fact going back into the latter portion of the first half, she had three lead-jammers to run off a string of nine consecutive lead jammer statuses.

And while the Houston crowd may have been extremely boisterous in the first half while their team was competitive and looking almost even with the Honeys at times, in the second half it was Rice Rocket gaining lead jammer status time-after-time that just seemed to take the wind out of the sails of the Bayou City fans, and perhaps even some of the less experienced Houston skaters. Lucille Brawl scored 42 points for the Hotrods and once in a jammer-on-jammer match up against Mistilla, the muscular HaRD Knock speed-jammer gave a hip check that would take out most mortal skaters, but Lucille just shrugged it off and looked over her shoulder as if to say, ‘That’s not enough!’

The Houston all stars were led in scoring by DeMentia with 25 points, followed by Mistilla with 22 points and Beverly Kills with 21 points. Houston was able to put a lot of pressure on the Hotrod Honeys with its all-star jammers who went five deep. But the Honeys stepped up on defense led by Tinkerhell’s amazing six jammer takeouts. Rebellika had three official jammer takeouts and numerous knockdowns. In fact, unofficially, every Hotrod Honey had a jammer takeout except for two of their young rookie skaters.

Houston was led in blocking by Beth Threat and Miss Lead who each had three jammer takeouts. As one HaRD Knock skater admitted after the game, “It was an amazing experience skating against their fast jammers, and blockers that skate with all of that speed.”

The Hell Marys opened up their game looking like one of the top teams in the league against the defending champs and soon established there has been a sea change. The perennial last place team blew out to a 17-0 lead after two jams, and it looked like this would be a long night for the Honky Tonk Heartbreakers. The Hells were skating big and fast, and the Heartbreakers were missing a couple of veterans from the lineups. So the HM’s quickly pulled some of their veteran jammers and let some of their young skaters jam, and some blockers that don’t normally jam skate as jammers. At the end of the first half the squad in red-plaid had jumped out to a 57 to 16 lead. The trend would not really change much in the second half with the Hell Marys outscoring the defending champs, 40-15.

Rookie Lady X would be the leading scorer for the game and the HM’s as she scored 38 points. Team Captain Apocalippz scored 14 points. The leading scorer for the Heartbreakers would be Olivia Shootin’ John with 17 points, and even though a rookie she gained lead jammer status three out of four times in second half.

Derringer led the Hell Marys with six jammer takeouts as she asserted herself, on a very defensive minded squad. Also skating very effectively on defense were all stars Buckshot Betsy, Bloody Mary, Sparkle Plenty, and Muffin Tumble. For the Honky Tonk Heartbreakers, Belle Starr was coming back off of an ankle injury and still was credited with eight effective blocks to lead her team on defense.

With the win, the Hell Marys are 2-0 on the season, and guaranteed a spot in the championship game in August against the also undefeated Hotrod Honeys. Both teams will meet next month on June 3rd in a real turf war to see who is the best team in the league. Also, The Hustlers will host the all-star team from Assassination City Roller Derby in Dallas in what should be another exciting interleague match up at Playland Skate Center.

Special Thanks to our Musical Guests:
Heather Rae and the Moonshine Boys
Shotgun Party

Spotlight charity:
Texas 4000 for Cancer.