Aces Exhibit Self-Organizing Behaviour in Latest Game

Aces bench

Readers of this blog are of course familiar with the theory of self-organization, whereby disordered systems, given enough time, will eventually spontaneously evolve towards behaviours that are organized in nature. Think of swarms of birds, or schools of fish, or the cellular automata theories made popular by Stephen Wolfram in his epic A New Kind of Science.

So it should come as no surprise that in their most recent game, the formerly dis-organized Black Aces suddenly and without warning began to show signs of self-organization. Passes were completed, goals were scored, and the final result was a 4-2 win over the Battlers, their first since 2014.

Team entomologist Pete T likened it to an ant colony. "Ants on their own are not very bright" said Pete after the game "But as a whole they can organize themselves into very effective machines. I believe that is what happened tonight. The Aces played like ants. I believe this has something to do with the fact that we were able to ice a critical mass of players, which we have not done for some time."

Team historian and recently returned elder statesman Rich W. had a different idea, however.

"The Battlers missed almost every chance they had" said Rich "Open nets, goalmouth scrambles, shooting at the goalie - they did it all. If they had scored on half their chances the game would have been different. All that math stuff is bullshit."

No matter which theory you subscribe to, the end result is the same and it looks like the blackshirts may be back on track after several weeks in the wednesday night wilderness.

Goal scorers: Mark, Bruce, Rich and Pete.