August 27, 2026
By Ryan Baker
As Championship Weekend is hours from the opening pull, here are some of the best soundbites from the first presser of the weekend:
Oakland Spiders
Head Coach Liam Kreiss
“Our team has gone through so much growth this year,” said Kreiss. “Every single player wanted to come back, wanted to be better, and wanted to learn from our mistakes.”
“We had to look ourselves in the mirror and say, we are not the best team in the league right now, but we can be,” said Kreiss.
“It’s pride for not only the Spiders themselves, but for the city of Oakland too,” Magsig said. It was hard not to fall in love with the dream of playing professional frisbee and professional sports in a major city. As we were going through the Athletics leaving and the Raiders leaving, the Spiders came to the Bay. They wanted to be here, and we are proud to be there.”
“This is the best version of the Spiders that we’ve ever seen, and I know we have a ton of room to keep getting better,” said Magsig.
“I’m always really hungry to keep growing and keep improving,” said Ritthaler.
“Something that makes me want to fight for Coach Liam is how much he puts into the team, how organized he is, how much he gives to every player, how open he is to giving feedback, and sending individual film clips,” said Ritthaler. “Any time a coach shows that they care so much about the team’s success in all of those little ways really makes it easier as a player to both respect and trust what they’re saying.”
New York Empire
Head Coach Anthony Nunez
“If you don’t expect him [Alex Atkins], with that type of personality, to try to get himself to become the best player onto the field, then you’re you just don’t know Alex,” said Nunez. “He wants to be the best player on the field, and he’s going to will himself to have that MVP level of a play. For Daan [De Marrée], the things that he does so well are something that unless you’re fully focusing on him, you don’t realize how great he is. It makes him even more of a weapon because people start to not think about him because he’s doing it so quietly.”
“What keeps me coming back is honestly moments like this,” Nunez said. “Also, players I’ve been coaching. It’s pretty surreal to have a close relationship with so many of my players, and I don’t want to just be successful onto the field. I want to provide them with the opportunities that I didn’t get as a player when I was younger.”
“We’re probably the most talented team here, so that might be the biggest thing separating us,” Atkins said. “Also, our coaches are really good; they do a lot of job getting us prepared.”
“The biggest factor was I’ve always been into ultimate, so I wanted to pursue ultimate as much as I could full time,” Atkins said. “New York is one of the few places that you can actually go to do that. That’s probably the biggest thing. The other thing is that I wanted to be on a good team and a team that was competing to win a championship, so definitely those two things have stayed consistent, and so far it’s working out well.”
“Tt was pretty hard on my mental,” De Marrée said about joining New York midseason. “I was like maybe it’s not going to happen this year. When we got the green light, I was super excited. It was pretty easy to go with the team and blend in with those players that had so much experience and respect my ability of frisbee.”
“It’s pretty weird to be honest when people say that,” De Marrée said about being coined as the best player in the world. “I’m just a boy from Leuven, Belgium, and I just enjoy playing. I still have a lot to get better at. But it is fun when people say that, to give the recognition that you put a lot of work in this sport. I have to back it up as well.”
Austin Sol
Co-Head Coach Casey Hogg
“If we play our game, it will be good enough to get the win,” said Hogg. “Especially down the stretch, there have been a lot of times where we could have changed up a lot, tried to go with something weird or off the wall to try and mix it up. For the most part, we trust our guys to make the plays that are in front of them, and they do a good job of that.”
“[Jackson] Potts has been putting in so much work behind the scenes,” said Hogg. “He gives us a playmaker. He gives us a huge body in space who uses his size really well. He gives us another great thrower. He has worked harder probably than any player on the team to get to the point where he is at. We were pretty sure he wasn’t going to be able to play this season.”
“When we need a guy to be open, it’s Kyle [Henke],” Hogg said. “When we need a guy to make a throw, it’s Kyle. When we need a guy to get a block, sometimes it’s Kyle. When we need a play to happen, you’re going to see either Kyle throwing it or Kyle catching it.”
“I’ve earned a few tells that I’m going to keep close to the chest for now,” Henke said. “I’ve gotten to share those with my teammates, and so I’m excited to see if those if those continue.”
“I’ve tried to enjoy the journey more than the destination,” Henke said. “I want to play my very best tonight. I want I want to win the game. I’ve just experienced a lot of gratitude for the journey.”
“Defensive fundamentals start in the handler space, trying to take away free resets, stopping uplines at all cost,” said Armour. “We have confidence in our athletes downfield, so as long as we make sure that those looks coming from the handler space are contested.”
“We were looking around at mini camps pretty early on,” Armour said about him, Evan Swiatek, and Duncan Fitzgerald returning after a year hiatus. “It’s never looked this good. It’s never felt this good.”
Minnesota Wind Chill
Head Coach Ben Feldman
“Having been here before, it comes with a little bit of confidence, but it also comes with some challenges of expectations for our players,” said Feldman. “We still carry that dog mentality.”
“We’re less predictable,” Feldman said. “Being less predictable is leading to more completion percentage because people are more open.”
“From day zero, it was our goal is to win a championship,” said Brandt. “We’re not peaking for the regular season or even the divisional playoff. We expected to get here. We expecting to get to the championship game tomorrow.”
“This is a really dangerous team that keeps winning games, and we really need to lock in and play our best game to be able to beat them,” Brandt said about the matchup against the Sol.
“Hunger is a mindset,” Burnett said. “If you can't have that mindset when you're not in the same place as the rest of your team, then I would say you're not really hungry.”
“This is 100 percent the best-run franchise in in the UFA,” Burnett said. “Ben Feldman is an absolute paramount professional with the way that he general manages this team and runs this team. It's going to remain a great organization, and you're going to continue to see these kind of consistent levels of output for a long time.”
