Raleigh Flyers Win First AUDL Title

After winning a 21-20 overtime thriller over the Chicago Union in the American Ultimate Disc League semifinals on Friday, the Raleigh Flyers defeated the New York Empire 19-16 to claim the 2021 title at Audi Field in Washington, D.C.  The Flyers had lost in the division finals to the Dallas Roughnecks in the previous three season and lost in their only trip to the AUDL championship weekend in 2015.  

From Alex Rubin of Ultiworld's report....

With just over a minute left, and New York needing to score quickly down 18-16, Jack Williams overshot Jon Lithio. Noah Saul picked up the turnover in his own end zone. Against a high pressure empire defense, Saul was forced to launch a desperate hammer, but Alex Davis made a bobbling catch. A few throws later it was Davis – a player not known for his throwing process – who shot deep to Josh Hartzog, who continued to Richardson as two Raleigh lifers connected to put the nail in New York’s coffin. The Empire’s last ditch prayer was blocked and the Flyers rushed the field in jubilant celebration.

With cancellation of the 2019 season and Canadian teams unable to compete with the other AUDL teams, Raleigh found themselves in an eight-team Eastern division, bringing along South Division teams Atlanta and Tampa Bay while former South Division teams Dallas Roughnecks and Austin Sol were moved to the West Division. In the East Division, they now faced the reigning AUDL Champions New York Empire as well as the DC Breeze, two of the three teams that they had faced in cross-divisional regular season play. With 8 teams in the East Division, and only five and six teams respectively in the Central and West Divisions, the East was allotted two playoff berths to the Final Four Weekend, and the Central, and West only allotted one. Raleigh finished the season at 8-4 with one loss to the Atlanta Hustle, one loss to New York Empire, and two losses to the DC Breeze. This put them in fourth place in the regular season standings behind those three teams which qualified them to play a semifinal game against the #1 seed.

Raleigh (11-4) began play in the AUDL in 2015 and have been a consistent winner.  They have an all-time record of 64-19.  

The New York Empire finished the season 12-3 and eliminated the San Diego Growlers 22-18 in their semifinal game. The Empire had been the reigning league champions from 2019.