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The first-ever D-III River City Showdown delivered everything you’d expect from a major early-season test—dominant favorites, bracket-shaking upsets, and a Cinderella run for the ages. Hosted in Richmond , VA as the successor to the FCS D-III Tuneup, this tournament was stacked with Nationals-caliber squads, including hosts and 2024 semifinalists #9 Richmond Spidermonkeys, and 2024 Nationals attendees #5 Carleton CHOP , #6 Franciscan Fatal, #16 Rochester Piggies, and #17 Oberlin Flying Horsecows. While Saturday followed the script, Sunday descended into the type of chaos that makes D-III ultimate so special. Let’s break it down.

Pool Play Powerhouses

By all accounts, pool play played fairly chalky. Every top seed in their pool dominated, with Carleton and #10 Elon Big Fat Bomb posting a +29 and a +26 point differential, respectively. Carleton’s Nathan Wang steered the CHOP offense with the patience of a seasoned veteran, methodically working the disc upfield and never forcing a look. For Elon, freshman Brayden Morrison is living up to the hype, while Reed Burkert continues to shine.

Besides an odd first universe game with Kenyon, Franciscan quickly cleaned it up, winning big in their next two games. Jude Schmiesing looked every bit an early POTY frontrunner, cutting through defenses like a hot knife through butter and routinely linking up with Matthew Gregor for easy goals.

Quarters Galore

Everything that seemed normal about Saturday immediately changed on Fields 20A and 20B. It seemed smooth sailing for Richmond, as they took half on Rochester 7-5, and soon made the score 9-6. One break turned into two. Then three. Suddenly, the Spidermonkeys’ smooth offense unraveled, and Rochester stormed to a stunning 13-9 comeback, sealing one of the biggest upsets of the weekend. Cameron Lowe and Mitch Whisner can take most of the credit for their huge upset, as they completely shut down Richmond’s cutters in the second half and played fantastic offense after the turn. In the fourth year in a row of the two teams’ battles, Rochester finally won the UR Championship.

Meanwhile, the next field over CHOP and UNC Asheville Mudpuppy played a barnburner of a game, with no team ever leading by more than two points. CHOP’s offense looked smooth and effortless—until UNCA’s height and speed started to take over. The tournament 16 seed looked every bit the part of a Nationals team (despite their weird 13-3 loss to Franciscan the day before), led strongly by freshman Ethan Rhodes, former captain of YCC Charlotte Flight. Other standouts included Jackson Stanley and Brandon Bass. Mudpuppy UNCA punched, counterpunched, and finally landed the knockout blow on CHOP in an 11-9 stunner, a fantastic result for a team that has not made Nationals since 2017.

Fatal Finale in the Mud

After the wild quarterfinal upsets, the two underdogs in Rochester and UNC Asheville themselves played in a close semifinal. David Leder for Rochester was a monster in the handler space, beating every matchup using his speed and frame to box out defenders. It still wasn’t enough, as Mudpuppy again scored a big upset on universe point to reach the final.

Franciscan and Elon meanwhile played on the other side of the semis in what could be called a “faux final.” Fatal’s small ball movement shredded Elon’s lanky defenders, leading to often easy scores. Still, Elon managed a narrow lead up until the last second. BFB had a chance to make it 10-8, but an endzone turnover resulted in a Franciscan hold, leading to another universe point game. A dropped under from Elon on their own line resulted in an easy score for Fatal, pushing to the finals with a 10-9 win. Despite Elon’s fantastic weekend, their semifinal—and particularly the last two postseasons—still raises questions about how the team will deal with pressure later in the season. At the end of the day, however, Elon appears to be in every shape and form as the Regional favorite and has a very good shot at their first Nationals since 2015.

By the time the final rolled around, Franciscan could smell blood in the water. Mudpuppy looked exhausted after their morning upsets, and Fatal quickly dismantled UNCA’s Cinderella’s story, making sure no fairy tale ending occurred. Fatal ultimately won 13-10, giving up most of their scores in garbage time. UNCA had nothing to hang their heads over, however, after reaching the final as the very bottom seed in the tournament. Currently, the recently updated frisbee-rankings.com shows UNCA in bid-earning range as well–huge for a team that would not enjoy needing to defeat Elon and Richmond at Regionals.

Meanwhile, Franciscan proves they are very much a semifinal favorite. ¹ Watch out for them as early D-III Easterns favorites at the end of the month.

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