Who: QUIDDITCH FANS (including multiple Campbell NPCs) What: The 2019 North American Quidditch League Championship Match! When: Saturday, April 6, 2019, morning into afternoon. Where: American National Stadium, Central Territory Warnings: ?? Notes: The game is simulcast on TV and radio and and live-updated on sports blogs, etc. You don't have to be there to follow the big game! And with this our Quidditch tournament is complete. Stay tuned next weekend for Quodpot opening weekend!
THE SETTING: Despite cloudy skies, it's a beautiful day for Quidditch at American National Stadium, located conveniently (or not so conveniently, depending on where you're coming from) at the geographic center of the Confederation. There's a forecasted high of 67 degrees, no rain is on the horizon, the No-Maj-Repelling Charms are keeping anyone who shouldn't know about the match far, far away, and fans from all across the continent (and beyond!) have converged on the gorgeous, modern stadium in the middle of the Central Territory plains to enjoy a day of Quidditch.
Hours before the match starts the stands are already filling with Roanoke blue and Kirkland green -- the explosive, exciting, reigning champion Riptide have many more supporters, but the underdog Kappas, who were national heroes last week for upsetting the hated Haileybury Hammers, have a strong contingent of fans in their corner as well. This isn't a rivalry match, and the mood is relatively relaxed -- there aren't likely to be many fights breaking out between supporters today, but excitement always runs high for championship games, and the hitwizards and league security stationed throughout the stadium are a very visible deterrent to misbehavior and will not hesitate to take action if fans get too rowdy.
The big question of the day was whether Riptide beater Nola Thibodeaux, who missed the semifinal after her arrest on a charge of illegal potions possession and has since been released on bail, would be allowed to play in today's match. #LetNolaFly and #FreeNola have been trending on social media for the past two weeks while the NAQL Ethics Board debated the question, and conspiracy theories have sprung up that her arrest was a nefarious scheme orchestrated by the Hammers, who had been expected to face the Riptide in today's final before their shocking defeat last week. Riptide fans rejoiced when the NAQL announced on Friday that Thibodeaux would be allowed to play while her trial was pending.
THE MATCH:At the whistle, both teams streamed into the air, and Roanoke started off strong by scoring five goals in the first twelve minutes of play, bamboozling keeper Flordeliza Torres with trick shots and really putting on display why this young string of chasers have become legends in their few years together. Kiki Pierce was going for the sixth unanswered Riptide goal at minute fourteen when a well-placed bludger from Nola Thibodeaux, who clearly had some aggression to work out, caught her in the shoulder and made her drop the quaffle right into veteran chaser and captain Hideko Nakamura's waiting hands. With that possession, the Kappas battled back to score three in a row with assistance from a furious barrage of bludgers at keeper Jupiter Mills. Over the next few hours the Riptide steadily increased their lead despite valiant efforts from the Kappas' offense and defense, until they passed the magical 150-point differential at three hours and eight minutes, and kept on climbing.
Meanwhile, the seekers wound around the quaffle and bludger battle, dodging attempts by opponents to knock them off their brooms and baiting each other with feints and dives, with no apparent snitch sightings until four hours and nineteen minutes in, when the score stood at 470-230 with Roanoke in a commanding lead. Both seekers spotted the snitch above the Kappas' goalposts at the same moment from the other side of the pitch, and it was a flat-out race that had the whole stadium on their feet and screaming. They were neck and neck when Nola Thibodeaux sent a hard bludger hit right at Lennox Campbell, which sent him careening into Aleks Ivanov and lost them both the snitch.
The match continued with both teams putting up a monumental fight. Hideko Nakamura and his chasers had a rally soon after when keeper Jupiter Mills was taken off the field briefly to be treated for a hand injury, putting up five unanswered goals in twenty minutes and whittling away at Roanoke's lead, though they remained 180 points behind at just under five hours of gametime. They fell further behind when chaser Jane Zhao, who had struggled with injury in the second half of the season, took a bludger to the back and was removed from the game entirely at five hours and twelve minutes, and when beater Ichiro Maki was ejected for bumphing at five hours and thirty-one minutes (in a controversial call that had Kappas fans on their feet and screaming and had more than one fan firmly disapparated away by security).
Finally, after five hours and fifty minutes in the air, with the Riptide at an unsurmountable 230-point lead, the snitch appeared again, glittering near the ground this time. Both seekers immediately went into heartstopping dives, and just when it looked like they were an eyeblink away from slamming into the ground, they both peeled away.
For a moment no one could tell if either of them had the snitch -- then Ivanov raised his fist with a madly fluttering wing poking out of it, the whistle blew, and the young, explosive Roanoke Riptide roll their way to a repeat and are once again NAQL champions. Final score: 720-340.