Philadelphia—the home of the Eagles, Phillies, 76ers, Flyers, Rocky Balboa, and one of the 2023 Spikeball Majors.

Philly is one of the greatest sports cities in the world with numerous championships and hall of fame players. But this past weekend, it was Thomas Hamilton and Ryan Marino of Rogue who etched their name into Philadelphia sports history.

Below:

• 🥊 Recapping the Philly Major

• 🌀 How to perplex your opponents with the FWANGO serve

• 🏀 Multi-sport athletes

Let’s get ready to rumble.

Premier Division

The 4th major of the 2023 season ended with Rogue taking home the title in Philly, staying undefeated in Majors played this year.

USA Roundnet’s two highest ranked players showed everyone they were worthy of this ranking, going 11W - 0L  for the tournament, including an impressive 16W - 3L record in sets, and winning 56% of all of the points they played.

But this was by no means an easy victory for Rogue, they had some absolute battles in bracket play that included three consecutive three-set victories in the Round of 16, Quarterfinals, and Semifinals, before defeating Critical Hit (Vincent Mathieu and Justin Barr) 23-21, 21-19 in the Final. 

In our Richmond Recap we asked if Rogue’s success was sustainable given their style of play. Apparently it is.

It was an up-and-down tournament for Critical Hit, who lost two matches in pool play. But when the playoffs began and the lights were brightest, these boys were at their best–cruising from the Round of 32 to the Semifinals without losing a set. In the semis, Critical Hit took on Judgement Day (Fredric Hinkle and Gabriel Finocchi) in what may have been the match of the tournament.

Judgement Day had yet to lose a set the entire tournament before their Semifinal match, but in the end, Critical Hit prevailed in a thrilling 19-21, 21-19, 21-19 victory. Judgement Day took down TRP Spotless in their last match to claim the third spot on the podium. 

In the Contender Division, Let’s Eat (Matthias Dreiling and Dennis Wei) dominated to earn their spot in the Premier Division–going 10W - 0L and winning an absolutely dominant 58.9% of points played. 

Women’s Division

On the women’s side, Ali Jenki didn’t participate, so her sister Olivia teamed up with Allie Foster to form VV Munchkins—and they took home the title. Foster has had some strong performances with a couple partners this season—most notably finishing 2nd at the Richmond Major with Karah Hui.

💃 How to FWANGO

What is the FWANGO serve? It is when you use your dominant hand to hit to the opposite side of your normal serve. 

Time to master the FWANGO. 

1. Start from the bottom: We are going to take a small step to the side of our non-dominant hand, then get on the toes of our trailing foot and rotate that knee inward–allowing our hips to move freely and open up to face the net. 

2. The dip: The next progression is to think about moving our hitting shoulder to our opposite knee–no twisting or crunching, just moving that shoulder towards the knee. 

3. Scratch the back of your head: The mental trick to have the correct arm placement for the FWANGO is to imagine scratching the back of your head, then simply swinging through the ball. 

How to Practice. 

1. Ditch the step: To start, all we’re going to do is put our arm in the head-scratching position and hit the ball on the net without the step–we want to focus on extending to the ball and not just pushing it. 

2. Shoulder down: Once we are comfortable with the correct arm motion, let’s start bringing that shoulder further and further down towards your opposite knee (but still without the step).

3. All together now: Now that we have the correct arm swing and deep shoulder dip, we are going to add the step to the equation to create the angle.

4. The toss: The arm motion, the shoulder dip, the step, we now only have one more key element to master before it is FWANGO time–the toss. The toss should be about a foot above your head, and straight upwards–a common mistake is to toss the ball too far in front of you and having to reach for it, as this will put a lot of stress on your lower body.

You can check out a full video breakdown from How to Roundnet.

👊 Quick Hits

🏀 What isn’t NBA Finals MVP Nikola Jokic good at?

❌ Don’t want to body block this ball…

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