Ranking the best players in the D-I Men's division in 2025.

May 2, 2025 by Ultiworld in Opinion

There’s no shortage of talent in the D-I college men’s division. We look a lot at team success, and often see familiar names and faces in those discussions. But who are the best individual players? Who brings the most value to winning a championship? Figuring out which stars shine the brightest is more art than science, but perhaps there’s democratic power in numbers.

So who are the best players in the division right now? To try to clear away as much of the white noise created by circumstance as possible and get to the heart of each individual’s value and contribution, we asked a diverse group of five members of our coverage team, as well as an anonymous group of elite players and coaches, to weigh in on the following prompt:

If you were starting a college team today with the singular goal of winning a theoretical D-I Championship this May, how would you rank the players within the division? You aren’t building a team of all of your selections, so don’t worry about how the players complement each other. Consider each pick the first pick of a team, drafting in order, only you can’t pick the players you’ve already ranked above. With regards to injuries an absences, we will include all rostered players unless there is confirmation a player will not be competing, or would not be able to compete, at Regionals and/or Nationals.

In order to improve how representative our rankings are of the opinions of our voters, we have iterated until arriving at this process. We each listed out our top 35 players to iron out some of the gradations on the fringes and then combined our lists to create a composite ranking. In addition, we included the ballots of a few anonymous elite players and coaches from different teams and regions. We used a weighted scoring system for votes, with Participants’ Ballots counting as 25%, Subscribers’ Ballots as 10%, and Staff Ballots comprising the remaining percentage.¹

We’ll start with our top 10, and discussion about that group. Then we’ll reveal the entire top 25, followed by the complete ballots, and additional conversations about the rankings.

The Top 10

Overall Rank	Player Name	Ranking Pts.	Josh Katz	Edward Stephens	Calvin Ciorba	Alex Rubin	Graham Gordon	Aidan Thomas	Emmet Holton	Patrick Stegemoeller	Keith Raynor	Participant (9) Ranking	Subscriber (23) Ranking
1	Ben Dameron	383.6	1	7	1	4	1	3	2	1	1	4	1
2	Tobias Brooks	379.6	2	2	4	1	2	1	1	3	2	1	2
3	Mica Glass	365.9	3	3	3	3	4	2	3	4	3	3	3
4	Dexter Clyburn	349.7	6	1	5	2	6	4	5	8	4	5	5
5	Anton Orme	345.8	4	5	9	8	7	6	4	7	6	6	7
6	Aidan Downey	341.6	5	20	6	5	8	13	8	2	7	2	8
7	Declan Miller	337.0	9	4	2	12	3	5	6	5	5	7	4
8	Kyle Lew	276.2	15	10	12	10	5	15	7	25	9	8	6
9	Josh Singleton	245.2	13	11	11	#N/A	11	9	11	11	25	9	11
10	Xavier Fuzat	241.0	8	14	14	22	9	14	12	13	8	14	13

There were three different players to earn a #1 vote: Ben Dameron (UNC), Tobias Brooks (Colorado), and Dexter Clyburn (Cal). Which one did you go with, and why?

Calvin Ciorba (Staff Writer): I went with Ben Dameron because of his all around skills — throwing and cutting along with his experience. There’s no one I’d feel more confident with the disc going into universe point in an important game.

Josh Katz (Staff Writer): I also had Dameron at the top for all the reasons Calvin said, and for the fact that he’s the only college player that played for Team USA last year at WUC. Brooks and Clyburn are both incredible talents, for sure, but Dameron is so good at so many things. There’s no one I’d rather build a team around right now.

Keith Raynor (Senior Editor): Add me to the Dameron #1 crew. I like that he has such big game bona fides and the longest track record. And his game is still growing. He’s really decisive offensively, and while people don’t think of him as a thrower, he’s really dangerous breaking the mark, maybe the most of the three.

Edward Stephens (D-I College Editor): #1 decision came down to three players for me: Dexter Clyburn, Mica Glass (Oregon), and Tobias Brooks. All three of them are capable, as they have shown, of carrying a college offense. The Takeover Factor, in my opinion, is the primary skill that defines a great college player. When necessary, will this player step up and absolutely control a point, a half, a game? The answer is a clear yes for all three of them.

So how to pick between them? That was hard. Brooks, in my opinion, is the best thrower in the college game right now (which is saying something considering the chops of Glass and Clyburn in that respect). On offense, nobody has more impact on the field this season than him. But on the defensive end, he’s not the sort of player (yet) who will go out and take the disc away. Combining both sides of the ball works better for Glass and Clyburn. Of the two, it’s Clyburn who, I feel, has the most potential for total game gravity. He can dominate in zone, he can dominate in matchup, he can dominate as a thrower, he can dominate as a receiver. And not just ‘can’ — he does do all those things for Cal Ursa Major. That kind of player would be my first choice for any college team.

Alex Rubin (Senior Staff Writer): I had a similar thought process to Edward, but I came away thinking Brooks was the obvious number one. He is the most talented offensive player in the division — I feel pretty comfortable bestowing that superlative upon the sophomore (!). If you don’t believe me, watch the semis and finals from Easterns in our video library and then give me a call if you still disagree. Brooks was fully in his bag dishing out all kinds of passes to all kinds of places and getting the ball back when he wanted it. He doesn’t offer as much as Clyburn or Glass on the defensive end, but he offers enough to match up with other team’s top options and slow them down. By the end of this season when Mamabird needed something big to happen, they turned to Brooks. If I’m thinking about the player I most want to build a team around, I’ll take the one with the most talent and the confidence to get the job done.

Graham Gordon (Contributing Writer): I definitely didn’t feel ridiculously confident about Dameron being my #1, especially given that he’s missed half of the regular season, but I was ultimately driven by the thought of where each player will be come Nationals. It’s probably true that Brooks is more valuable to Mamabird than Dameron is to Darkside, but in terms of pure unguardability as a downfield player, unlimited bag of break throws, and ability to cross over and defend anyone in the division, I’m still taking Dameron until someone else proves themself on the biggest stages in college. It feels like Brooks is being anointed into this spot based on being the best at the most recent tournament, and that’s not enough for me (not to say that he’s not been great all year!)

Rubin: What does Ben Dameron do better than Tobias, Dexter, or Mica might be a different way to phrase this question. I remain unconvinced by the Dameron arguments.

Raynor: Win. That’s the answer to your question.

But more seriously, he’s clearly the best isolation cutter of those four. And he has the most proven track record of high level performance at college levels and beyond. Even then, I think he’s of similar caliber or the second best in a bunch of categories within this group.

I really don’t think I agree with Edward’s assertion we haven’t seen Dameron rise to be the guy. That feels like recency bias based on his recent season where he wasn’t fully present. He has elevated himself to that role for Darkside at Nationals, and even did that for points for Ring of Fire over their past two seasons.

Stephens: I would like to clarify that I didn’t say (or, didn’t intend to say) that we haven’t seen Dameron be The Guy. We so have. What I meant is that we aren’t seeing it this season, and I always view this exercise as a this season exercise. I feel like a bring this up every year: I was roundly mocked for having Dena Elimelech over Jack Verzuh in 2019, which I based on that exact same reasoning. Look how it turned out.

And as far as isolation cutting is concerned? One of the most recent images we have of top-tier play in the men’s division this season is Brooks abusing the Dameron matchup to get wide open deep for the game winner in the Easterns semifinal. Dameron had a fairly quiet game. To me, that difference speaks volumes.

Rubin: Keith is right that Ben is the best isolation cutter in the division and he is absolutely a plus with the disc. But I wouldn’t really want the disc centered to him the same way I would the other three above him on my list. In club and beyond that doesn’t matter as much because the relative skill of the handler level is higher, but in college having a premier thrower elevates a team more than a premier cutter. Essentially, Ben Dameron is the best RB of this NFL draft. He’s going to have a big impact, but the best quarterback is going to go ahead of him even if their “Madden” rankings don’t follow that same order.

Patrick Stegemoeller (Senior Staff Writer): Not to turn this thread into a detailed film analysis, but Brooks didn’t “abuse” an iso cutting matchup to get the game winner on Dameron, he made an upline cut and kept going up through the forceside lane, Dameron lags off of him to junk the lane which is definitely in system for UNC, and Singleton makes the incorrect read as the over-the-top defender by abandoning the cap.

Stephens: Tomato, tomato.

Stegemoeller: I think Dameron is the best cutter in the division and is ruthlessly efficient with the disc in his hands. He has a well-developed sense for where an opposing defense is weak or what they are uncomfortable doing, and then just piledriving the disc through that weak point over and over again. To my eyes he is the best defender of the candidates for the #1 spot (Clyburn is close) and his skills translate the best to an elite team (probably why he’s the one with a 1st Team All-Club honor).

If the question is “who could drag some scrubs to Nationals” then I’m taking Brooks or Mica. If it’s “who is going to make a Nationals-caliber team most likely to win a title” then give me Dameron all day.

Stephens: You’re all wrong about one thing: Ethan Lieman (UMass) is the best isolation cutter in the division. Dameron and Brooks are both in that conversation but ultimately fall short.

Setting that smaller quibble aside: Clyburn, Brooks, and Glass are the high-ceiling guys who, this particular regular season, are playing like they want it the most. Dameron, to me, isn’t showing the same kind of hunger in 2025 that those three are or that he has in the past, so he didn’t make the final round of consideration for me. The ‘right now’ element is a powerful factor for me.

I agree with the rest of Patrick’s assessment – maybe pausing for a moment on the word ‘efficient’ but letting it slide since I’m not sure how we’re defining it – about the way Dameron plays. He’d be top 3, and possibly 1, if I were drafting college players for a club team.

Ben Dameron made the second tryout for the World Games team USA – and apparently played very well there – and has been one of the best players on club team Raleigh Ring of Fire for at least the past two seasons. Those are massive skill indicators for him. Fittingly, he finished near the top of the list and collected several First-Place votes. One voter, however, ranked him much lower than the others: Edward had him down at 7.

Edward… really?

Stephens: The focus of this exercise, in my mind, is not who would make a World Games team. On a World Games team or an elite level club team, there’s a degree to which you can focus on excellence within your lane, since there’s almost always a guarantee that you are surrounded and supported by six other brilliant athletes. On a college team, it’s a lot more uneven, and so the greatest players will always have a mind set of taking control of the game. Can anyone guard a full speed Ben Dameron at this level? Eh, probably not.

But what I don’t see from him – at least not this particular college season – is the desire to have the disc in his hands and run the show for UNC. I nearly listed his teammate Josh Singleton (UNC) ahead of him for that reason, and I could have also entertained the idea of dropping him below Matt Barcellos (UNC). 2025 Dameron is still, from a skills perspective, at absolute minimum a top-3 player in the division, and likely #1 if you consider his complete package. But I don’t see him wanting to be The Guy in the context of this college season. And I’d rather opt for several other players who want to shoulder that burden.

Rubin:I totally agree, and landed in a similar place with Dameron below three players who I think dominate in college better than he does. I do wonder if he “suffers” a bit from the Fury Effect. On Darkside he hasn’t had to do it all. The few times we’ve seen him cross over to a D-line without a co-star, he’s managed the offense just fine, which makes me wonder how he would do as the centerpiece of a team a la Clyburn at Cal or Tristan Yarter (Pittsburgh). My hunch is he in particular has a bigger bag of tricks than we see because his college team is built like more of a club team than any other college team in the country. That also might have helped him ascend the club and National Team ladders since he didn’t have to waste training time on side projects that could help his college team.

Stegemoeller: I’ve put this somewhere else, but for me the question isn’t who you would stick on some random college team, the question is who would make a Nationals-caliber college team most likely to win a title. (Otherwise we would largely be removing defense and cut timing and many other things important to playing good ultimate from the equation and reducing the question to “who is the best volume thrower?”)

So yes, I think that being an elite college player does call for some different risk thresholds than in club, and for that matter being the best volume thrower will get you pretty far in college. Being able to just make stuff happen is more important the lower the level of play is.

But if we’re taking about being able to help a team win at an elite level in college, the skill set is still pretty similar to what you are looking for in club, and often players who make themselves “the guy” can put a ceiling on their team’s ability to win at the highest level.

There were a number of players who ended up in every voter’s top-10: Dameron, Brooks, Glass, Clyburn, Anton Orme (Cal Poly SLO). Other overall top-10 players, though, had some outlier ballots. Alex was lower than the group on both Declan Miller (Carleton) and Xavier Fuzat (Texas). Edward had Aidan Downey (Georgia) down at 17, far from the top 10.

Rubin: Declan Miller is a really talented player who has never won a game at College Nationals despite having a very talented team. I expect he’ll prove me wrong in a few weeks and I will wish I ranked him higher, but until then I feel fine leaving him where he is.

Xavier Fuzat is really, really good but he is miscast as a lead thrower on this Texas team. He is best as a Ben Dameron-lite (dominating the cutting lanes and throwing from flow) and he has made too many mistakes in a role not truly designed for him for me to really want to make him capital T capital G The Guy on a team to win Nationals. He is definitely a Top 25 player, but he needs someone ranked higher playing with him to really unlock his super powers (which is another reason why it would have been great to see him on the U24 team — I think he’d be better in that setting than as the leader of a middle of the pack College Nationals team).

Stephens: Fuzat is tricky. At the end of the day, I’m not sure he meshes well on most college rosters because he offers such a unique skill set. Sometimes he’s playing his own game out there and the rest of TUFF have to figure out on the fly how to hop in with him. One of those guys who, if we are drafting for club (or cough a U24 team) I look at in the top 5, but I’m not sure if college is 100% his best showcase.

So, I think Downey loses a little without having Adam Miller around as a steadying presence. (Is it steadying or is it just the fact that they lived on the same frisbee brainwave for like 8 straight years?) When I have watched him play this season, he has pushed himself beyond what he can reliably execute, and it has resulted in much less efficient play. Raw talent would have him much higher than the division-tailored judgment this exercise demands.

Stegemoeller: Georgia being worse this year does not make Aidan Downey a worse ultimate player. I think people are really forgetting what this guy can do because of how much Georgia has struggled with their roster turnover (and Downey not playing at Easterns). Has all of the walking-bucket skillset of the other top 5 guys, great size, and can get after it defensively.

The Top 25 and Beyond

---

1. Our experience has shown that participants’ ballots trend towards regional concentrations and emphasizing the strength of their teammates, as well as other quirks such as occasionally not ranking themselves, which is why their ballots are weighted in this manner. ↩