Entertainment

You don’t need to understand ultimate frisbee to appreciate this incredible play

Sit back, watch and enjoy.
Sit back, watch and enjoy. Sit back, watch and enjoy.

Sometimes you don’t even need to know the rules of a sport to realise you’ve just seen something special happen in a match.

That’s exactly the case with this college ultimate frisbee game in Virginia, US, but it also helps to know it had gone to sudden death – known as universe point – and this was the play that won it.

With the scores at 12 apiece, that final point was scored by Georgetown catcher Danie Fain in what video-maker and ultimate frisbee fan Akshat Rajan said was “one of the greatest upsets in College Ultimate history”.

“UNC Wilmington was heavily favoured,” he told the Press Association. “Georgetown was ranked 76 in the nation.”

The match was being played in the Atlantic Coast Men’s D-1 Regionals in Axton.

By winning this game after that play, Georgetown would go on to defeat University of Virginia to qualify for Nationals, something nobody expected, said Akshat.

Georgetown celebrate
Georgetown celebrate (Akshat Rajan/YouTube)

On universe point Akshat says teams are “usually more conservative”, but not in this case, with Georgetown player Christian Boxley managing to keep the frisbee in play without touching the ground.

“If it were caught there, it would’ve been incomplete as the player caught the frisbee out of bounds,” said Akshat.

“Instead, he pulls off a play known as a Greatest, which is an extremely rare and difficult play made when someone catches a frisbee out of bounds and throws it back in bounds while still in the air and with his feet not touching the ground.

“To add to that, one of the Georgetown players attempts to catch it, is slides off of his hand, and into Danie Fain’s hands, who makes an incredible layout extension grab to score.”