Redneck Betties still chasing Sugar Skulls
Swift Current’s Redneck Betties ran into one of the Canada’s top roller derby teams on Saturday. The Betties lost 267-136 to the visiting Sugar Skulls, who are currently ranked 12th in the country.
The result was never in doubt from the opening jam but the Betties fought their way right until the end against a deep, talented, and physical opponent loaded with members of Team Saskatchewan.
“Honestly we came into this one hurting, we have a lot of injuries on our team,” said coach Vic Vega after the loss.
“We knew that we were going to have to play our absolute best game to have a chance to beat them.
This is ‘ the’ team in Western Canada, there is no doubt about that. For our girls to do what they did out there, the last time we played them we lost by about 20 points more, so this is an improvement and we are happy.”
The Betties are cur- rently ranked 27th in the Canadian Roller Derby Rankings on rollergirl.ca, but they will have a long way to go to catch a team like the Sugar Skulls.
“How do you beat the best in the country? They are amazing and I love what they are doing. Hats off to them, they played strong and hard. We scared them. We gave them a little bit of Betties derby and it was good,” said Vic Vega.
“We have been working on some things,” explained Sugar Skulls’ blocker Maiden Sane, who was named the team’s Player of the Game.
“We have some issues with all the girls coming to practice at times, so we set our lines in a fashion where girls will naturally fall into their proper roles. It felt a bit scattered some of the girls were saying, but that is also because we were up against really strong opponents that one their main things is scattering walls. I thought we did really good.
“We met quite a few of the goals that we set forth, not as many penalties as some of the other games we’ve had. We wanted to double the score and I think we just fell short of that.”
The Sugar Skulls featured one former member of Team Canada and a handful of players that skate for Team Saskatchewan.
“That core group has been together for about six years now and they keep adding to it and adding to it.
We lost seven starters from the beginning of last year to this year, so that’s where we kind of fall back and they are able to maintain a core group of girls and it’s awesome,” explained Vic Vega.
“The last time we played them was at Centrals in Moose Jaw last year,” explained Maiden Sane, who skated for Team Canada in 2011.
“They have had a few rosters changes with some retiring and we even had a girl, Smash Vegas, that moved to our league, so they have been rebuilding.
“That’s always tough for a team, but you wouldn’t know it by playing against them tonight because, from an opponents perspective, they play so well together as a team. Even with those large characters missing from their line-ups they are still really strong.”