On May 17, both the girls and non-binary (GNB), and open ultimate teams competed at the New England Prep School Ultimate League (NEPSUL) tournament. The tournament is a culmination of the teams’ season with schools across New England competing.
Andover’s teams had strong performances in skill and spirit throughout the tournament with the GNB team earning the spirit of the game award.
“For the results of the tournament there are two categories: the winners based on win-losses and winners based on the spirit, because Ultimate is a game that’s based a lot on spirit. The GMB team won first place in the Spirit award,” said Jennie Kang ’28.
Beyond its eventual spirit award, the GNB team saw a comeback (12-4) victory in the last of its three games. Although the team suffered defeat in its first two matches, Jane Hlavaty ’28 maintained enthusiasm throughout the tournament, using the environment as a learning experience to further improve their game.
“I feel like the whole tournament wasn’t too high stakes, at least for me. I’m not sure if that’s what I should’ve been feeling at the moment, but I was just trying to learn as much as I could as we were trying to adapt throughout every single game. Mental preparation for the tournament was more about knowing that your team has your back, and that they’re there to support you,” said Hlavaty.
For the open team as well, flexibility was paramount to successful play with players experienced and not pushed into different positions and styles of play when faced against unfamiliar opponents. Dean Yang ’27, a player on his second year on the team, shared how he shifted positions throughout the tournament saying,
“I usually only play handler. Usually, the times when I stray away from the position is in our vertical stack offense when advancing the disc downfield and sometimes I end up running down and being the deepest option, so I might cut in and become a cutter for a bit but then I just reset back to being a handler. Against Choate I operated like more of a popper, and I was able to do this because their zone is very wide which allowed for a lot of movement. As a popper, I could actually go back between a handler position and a position that is pretty cool,” said Yang.
Members of both of Andover’s ultimate teams highlighted the tournament’s commitment to upholding the spirit of the game, ultimate’s pillar of sportsmanship. As a self-adjoint sport, sportsmanship and respect for opponents are critical to game play. Andover specifically highlighted the Choate and Hotchkiss teams.
“The two teams that impressed us this year were Choate and Hotchkiss. They are both always very consistent with their spirit of the game. We noticed this last year against Choate. They actually won the spirit of the game award last year at NEPSULs. Choate and Hotchkiss, but especially Choate, always come to play with a really positive attitude. They are always complementing us and giving us high-fives. We tried to return the favor this year,” said Yang.
The GNB team is currently led by Serafina Shin-von Nordenflycht ’25 whose seven years of experience in the sport has created an energetic, welcoming, and instructional environment for newcomers to the sport such as Kang.
“Fina basically led the team throughout the entire year. Our captains are getting announced both for the boys open team and the girls team next week. I’m very, very looking forward to that,” said Kang.
Both ultimate teams will end their seasons on May 23 with the opening team facing off against The Cambridge School of Weston, and the GNB team facing Lexington High School.
