As is tradition in the sport of ultimate, Josie Gillett ’19 got a nickname when she joined Cold Front, the ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ women’s club team.

And it was a prophetic one: Future. Led by Gillett, the squad’s first-year phenom from Seattle, Cold Front qualified for the national tournament for the first time in 2016.

Three years later, the future is here for Gillett and the team: They head into the national tourney, which takes place Saturday and Sunday in College Station, Texas,

While Gillett’s arrival immediately raised the team’s sights and bolstered its talent (she was already a member of Team USA’s Under-19 squad), Cold Front’s progress since then has been a collective effort, says Gillett.

“Honestly, I think I had the biggest impact my first year. Since then other people have been able to help grow the program and teach new players.”

A video about Cold Front and Josie Gillett ’19 by Assistant Sports Information Director Aaron Morse:

Gillett will graduate on May 26 with a major in environmental studies. Active in the college’s sustainability movement as a member of the EcoReps, a student task force for green initiatives on campus, Gillett has been a pivotal figure in the founding of the new college garden, The Plot.

She wrote her thesis on “ (In her acknowledgments, she gives a shout-out to Cold Front “for the unquantifiable love and happiness you have given me over the past four years.”)

Among ultimate enthusiasts, Gillett is best-known for her talent, and she’s a finalist for the 2019 Donovan Award, the sport’s national player-of-the-year award.

Yet at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, her ultimate ultimate legacy, as it were, will likely be a team culture that welcomes and teaches players with little or no experience.

Last July, Josie Gillett ’19 (left) and Katharine Gaillard ’19 pose among some of their 180 tomato plants in the Plot, the college garden near campus. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

That combination of support for newbies and pursuit of excellence “is surreal. It really is,” Maddie Sirois ‘21 of Maplewood, N.J. “I wasn’t originally going to try out but everyone gathered behind me and really encouraged me to do it. And it’s been great.”

“She’s a total role model for everyone on this team.”

Of course, Gillett and Cold Front aren’t doing it alone. The team has two part-time coaches, and its co-founder, Lynne Lewis, Elmer Campbell Professor of Economics, serves as the team’s faculty adviser.

Gillett is humble about her own talent and leadership. But when it comes to teaching the sport, she takes charge. And there’s one word that seems to describe Gillett best: patient.

“Something I’ve learned as a returning player is the patience that’s needed to teach these fundamentals of the sport,” says Anna Helms ’20 of Larchmont, N.Y.

“It’s really made me respect her a lot. She’s a total role model for everyone on this team.”

The ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ women’s Ultimate team is in uncharted — and unexpected —waters this weekend as the club competes in the Division III College Championships.

Earning a tournament bid was “never something I expected playing Ultimate at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½,” says co-captain Ruthie Baker ’16 of Minneapolis. “For us, it’s been a really cool thing to watch the team transform in such a way.”

Known as Cold Front, the club is in the 16-team tourney and faces Luther College of Decorah, Iowa, at 9 a.m. Saturday.

Per usual when it comes to national competition, NESCAC has a big presence, with ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, Wesleyan, Amherst, and Williams in the tourney.

Co-captain Josie Gillett ’19 of Seattle is a member of the U19 national team heading to Poland this summer for the World Junior Ultimate Championships.

Josie Gillett ’19 of Seattle delivers a pass during practice on May 12, 2016. (Josh Kuckens/ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ College)

“I’ve been playing on competitive teams nonstop since sixth grade,” she says. “But I don’t think I’ve seen a group of teammates progress as much in a single season as this team has. That has been incredibly, incredibly rewarding.”

“I’m not their professor. I’m their superfan.”

Cold Front’s adviser is Elmer Campbell Professor of Economics Lynne Lewis, who’s seen the sport go from casual to competitive at ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½, as it has nationally, since she arrived in 2000.

For her, “it’s wonderful to get to know these young people in a different way” than being their teacher in a classroom.

“I’m not their professor. I’m their mentor, their coach. I’m their superfan.”

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ÀÖ²¥´«Ã½ has Orange Whip, while Colby has the Dazzlin’ Asses. To the south are Bowdoin’s Stoned Clowns. In Vermont are the Middlebury Pranksters.

So, the names of some nearby Ultimate Frisbee college teams prove that the sport still gets its ya-yas out by flaunting a late-’60s counterculture attitude. Yet, says Adam Miller ’09 of Seattle, Wash., who played on the U.S. squad that won the World Junior Championships last month, Ultimate has slowly “evolved from kind of a hippie sport into a competitive sport with very good athletes.” Read more here.