The masterminds behind the division's best teams
November 21, 2024 by Zack Davis, Felicia Zheng and Edward Stephens in Awards with 0 comments
Ultiworld is pleased to announce our annual Club Awards. While we consider both regular season and postseason performance, because of the nature of the Club division, we weight success in the Series and at Nationals above all else. This year, with an uneven regular season, the postseason emphasis is perhaps greater than ever. The Club Awards are voted on by Ultiworld reporters, contributors, and editors.
The Coach(es) of the Year closes our annual awards. As so many teams have added more and more sideline-savvy consultants to their roster with less asked of a single head coach, this has essentially morphed into “Coaching Staff of the Year.” Coaches can impact the game in so many ways — tactics, motivation, communication, personnel management, program development, skill-building, etc. — and it can be hard to divine what exactly each has contributed to their team. But good coaching is something that we feel that “we know it when we see it.”
Player of the Year Award
All-Club First Team
All-Club Second Team
Defensive Player of the Year Award
Offensive Player of the Year Award
Breakout Player of the Year Award
Coach(es) of the Year Award
Club Awards Voting Breakdown
Snubs and Superlatives
2024 Women’s Division Coach(es) of the Year
Matty Tsang, Meeri Chang, Sarah Griffith (San Francisco Fury)
To build such a storied program, year after year, iteration after iteration, takes a level of genius and dedication that few coaches can lay claim to. In a year where the cards weren’t exactly in their favor, Fury’s coaches have done it again.
In 2024, Fury had to rebound from the loss of veteran players like Opi Payne and Lisa Couper and integrate a crop of new rookies into their system. There was speculation that the team would take a step back with their roster losses, but Fury showed their resilience and adaptability by building the deepest team in the division – a team so skilled from top to bottom that every player in the rotation could be trusted to execute on offense and defense.
Beyond team make up, Fury had strategies to stymie the best offenses in the division and looked dominant in their nationals bracket run, taking down 6ixers, Molly Brown and Scandal on their way to the title. They had a game plan for everything their opponents could throw at them and executed on it with ease. That level of preparation can only be the result of hours of research, strategizing, and meticulous planning.
Fury’s coaches’ brilliance shone through this year in their ability to bring new talent into the fold and win a championship in an increasingly competitive field. Title number 13 is a testament to their unwavering commitment to building the best possible version of Fury, time and time again.
– Felicia Zheng
First Runner-up
Jordan Meron, Matthew Caldwell, Alyssa Mason (Toronto 6ixers)
Managing a club season is never an easy task, and it’s especially tricky every year for Canadian clubs who have to navigate more travel hurdles and competition commitments than their American peers. Those built-in difficulties mount even more in a Worlds year like 2024, where, due to the national team’s schedule, 6ixers did not even field a team at either the US Open or Pro Champs, the tournaments most likely to give them Nationals-like competitive reps as a unit. Nonetheless, they put their best foot forward at Nationals, pushing both Molly Brown and Brute Squad to the brink in pool play, fending off a feisty Schwa side to reach quarters, and putting away Phoenix to qualify for Pro Flight. Game planning for their stars and role players alike was effective, and their motivation stayed sharp throughout.
– Edward Stephens
Second Runner-up
Ty Aderhold, Kath Ratcliff (Washington DC Scandal)
It takes a special kind of grit to make the final in recurring years, especially in a division that is seeing more and more talent at the top of the game. Scandal, however, got the formula right. Even though there are a lot of factors that go into propelling a team to continued success it starts at the top. The Scandal coaching staff of Ty Aderhold and Kath Ratcliff understood their squad and played to their strengths while minimizing the few weaknesses they had. Scandal’s high powered offense is as much a product of the team’s strategy as it was their talent. Coaching can be a bit of black box, but Aderhold and Ratcliff have made it clear that their leadership is a major part of the Scandal program.
– Zack Davis
