Defensive Player Of The Year Ambrose Re-Signs With Seattle


January 2, 2025
By Adam Ruffner

Following their first Championship Weekend appearance in eight years, the Seattle Cascades entered the offseason with a focus on keeping their young core intact. The team announced the re-signing of 2024 All-UFA selection Garrett Martin on a two-year contract during the holidays, as well as bringing back 50-goal scorer Zeppelin Raunig, primary handlers Spencer Lofink and Marc Muñoz, and starting defenders Jack Brown, Tony Goss, Dominic Jacobs, and Tommy Lin for the 2025 campaign.

But the biggest news came on the final day of the year. After leading the league in blocks in each of the past two seasons, the reigning Defensive Player Of The Year Lukas Ambrose committed to a one-year deal to rejoin Seattle on December 31. Ambrose tallied 34 blocks in his first season with the Cascades—the most in a single season in the UFA since 2017—and helped Seattle as a team finish third in takeaways per game in 2024. 

“This team is infectious,” Ambrose told Evan Lepler after the team’s semifinals appearance last August. “The energy, the buy-in, the talent, Seattle’s got a great ultimate environment that, coming from LA, I’d never seen before.”

Since entering the league as a rookie in 2023, Ambrose has been its most impactful player on the defensive side of the disc. In addition to his league leading 58 blocks over the past two seasons, Ambrose has accumulated 46 goals in just 28 career starts while playing over 81 percent of his points on D-line. And while his dominant coverage abilities are what make him a star, Ambrose has quickly evolved as a thrower in his first two seasons; during his rookie year, Ambrose had just two starts with over 10 completions, compared to 10 such games last season with Seattle, where he showcased an expanded role as a distributor on the Cascades counterattack.  

Before Ambrose’s arrival in Seattle, the Cascades were cellar dwellers in the West Division, and endured an eight-year playoff drought due to a revolving door of lineups. Now with Ambrose and much of their core set to return, Seattle has its sights set on their first league championship.