Hochschulbowl 2011 - Engineers get the hat trick

On the weekend of July 9 and 10, the Karlsruhe Engineers won the adh-Open American Football for the third time in a row. The Engineers can thus continue to call themselves German University Champions in American Football. As hosts of the tournament, the Karlsruhe university team is of course doubly pleased to be able to keep the trophy.

But the way there was a hard piece of work. Most of the players of the Karlsruhe Engineers have already had to pay a lot of dues in the second Bundesliga this season, as most of the students play for the Badener Greifs in the regular league. As a newcomer, the team is expected to have a hard time and has already suffered many defeats. However, it quickly became apparent that the usual toughness of the second league was a clear advantage at the Hochschulbowl. In the first game, the Engineers were able to defeat Hamburg clearly with 35:6. In the immediately following game against the still fresh Mannheim team, the Engineers hardly allowed any points, but were able to score points themselves through their varied passing and running game. In the end, the score was 28:7 for the Engineers.

On the second day of play, the team faced Hamburg again in pouring rain. The guests from the north had considerable problems moving the ball under the difficult conditions, while the second-league proven offense of the Karlsruhe team was hardly impressed. The scoreboard then showed 28:0 for Karlsruhe at halftime, when the Hamburg team abandoned the game in a hopeless position due to the weather. With the title almost in the bag, the team had to take to the field one last time against Mannheim. Eager to inflict a defeat on the hosts, the Mannheim team came up with a rather unusual tactic. In order to drive the Engineers' defense backwards, they pushed the Karlsruhe team backwards meter by meter with a massive running game through the middle. However, after the hosts adapted to this massive variation of the running game, the Mannheim team could not find any means. The Karlsruhe offense, as before, defied the still wet weather and continued to score. In the end, the hosts from the fan city won again with 14:0. The Karlsruhe Engineers thus win the adh-Open American Football undefeated for the third time in a row and underline their current dominance in college football.