The Braunschweig Lions started later into the season because Covid restrictions in Lower Saxony hadn't allowed them adequate time to prepare and even then their first home game was held in front of empty ranks.
While Braunschweig surprised many with their relatively lackluster on-field performance, they still made it into the playoffs at 5–5 in fourth place which however meant they had to go on the road to Schwäbisch Hall who dominated the GFL South in even stronger fashion than before the pandemic as their only serious intra-division adversary from previous seasons, Frankfurt Universe could only field a rump team of local youth players after most of their starting line-up from 2019 jumped ship for the ELF.
In the North their Baltic namesakes had yet another season of committed mediocrity with only occasional moments showing the top team they had been a few years prior.
Like Hildesheim and Elmshorn who withdrew ahead of the season, Kiel also suffered from the proximity of the Hamburg Sea Devils as many players in the Northern German region had commuted between Hildesheim, Kiel, Hamburg, Lübeck and other GFL cities in previous years depending on where they would find the most favorable playing conditions – most of that talent pool had been scooped up by the ELF for 2021.
Dresden ultimately won the remaining nine regular season games after their loss in Cologne, placing ahead of Potsdam who let the theoretical chance to win a division title (if they had beaten Dresden at Heinz Steyer Stadion by 16 or more points in their last regular season game, they would've won the head-to-head breaking the hypothetical 8–2 tie in win-loss record) pass by mostly playing their backups in their lopsided 63–7 loss.
In the South the Munich Cowboys and the Allgäu Comets filled the remaining playoff spots behind Hall and Saarland.