Matthew "Rowan" McDonnell: 2018 AUDL MVP

In October, Matthew "Rowan" McDonnell won the AUDL MVP for the 2018 season. Rowan becomes the 5th player to win the Most Valuable Player in the 7 seasons of the American Ultimate Disc League, and the first player from the East Division to win the award. Rowan made the First Team All-East AUDL in 2017. The MVP is quite an accomplishment for someone who only discovered ultimate in seven years ago.

In early October, The Washington Post ran a hype article for the DC Breeze player, and Rowan was quoted in a Washington Times article in July 2018.

Rowan's stats were impressive - 4.7 assists/game, 3.8 goals/game, and 393 completions (95.50%), plus 1.1 blocks/game on defense - over 10 games of the Breeze's 14-game regular season.

AUDL is selling a commemorative poster of Rowan:

Rowan's local (New London, Connecticut) paper published a profile of the AUDL MVP.

Rowan recalls his first time witnessing an ultimate Frisbee game; it was in 2011.

Rowan: "I didn't even know what it was, but I felt immediately hooked. The first thing I saw was this kid throw it 70 yards, and I was like wow, I want to do that."

East Lyme native carves out career in Ultimate Frisbee [The Day]

Later in the article, Rowan admits: "All I knew is that I wanted to play Ultimate."

Rowan continues: "Shaping my life around a fringe sport was never easy. But I purposely chose to do that because I figured, if I kept getting my name out there, and if I kept coaching and gaining experience for myself, it would eventually allow me to make a career out of Ultimate."

Rowan (Th-rowan?) McDonnell is a member of of the DC men's club ultimate team Truck Stop, coach of the American University women's college ultimate team, and founder of American Ultimate Academy in Washington, DC, which offers trainings and summer camps.