Running with Rugby
By Shelly Wilson (Athletic Management, 14.5, August/September 2002)
No longer just for bloodied, beer-swilling louts, rugby is finding new popularity among American students. In response, several schools are turning their club teams into varsity sports.
Turn on ESPN in the wee hours of the morning,
or surf past Sky Sports on a Sunday, and you may come across a scene of padless
athletes making their way up a field as they continually pass a ball behind
them, deliberately toss teammates 12 feet in the air, and engage in what
appears to be tightly tangled head-to-head combat. What you’ve stumbled upon is
the game of rugby.
And while it may not currently be on your radar, that may change in the next
few years. Already one of the most played and watched contact sports in the
world, rugby is growing stateside. According to the May 2002 edition of Rugby
Magazine, there are currently 1,765 rugby clubs actively competing in the
United States, up from 1,651 last year. The fastest-growing segment is youth
rugby, where the number of clubs increased 48 percent over the last two years
to 411—and the majority of those are high school clubs. Of that number, 76 are
girls’ clubs, up nine percent from last year.
“Word of mouth is spreading,” says Anthony Mattacchione, Head Coach of the
boys’ rugby team at Jesuit College Prep in Dallas, which made its club team a
varsity sport in 1999. “Like soccer, it’s taking off because it’s a sport that
a lot of kids can play, and it’s not expensive to sponsor.”
Rugby has long been a popular club sport at the collegiate level. Rugby
Magazine’s data shows there are 302 collegiate women’s clubs and 432 collegiate
men’s clubs. And this past May, the NCAA Division I Board of Directors granted
women’s rugby emerging sport status—a nod to its growing popularity and future
growth potential. And legislation extending that designation to Divisions II
and III is in process.
With an increasing number of players and its governing body, USA Rugby, making
efforts to expand the sport at the grassroots level, college and high school
administrators may soon face queries from their own students about making rugby
a varsity sport. In this article, we’ll discuss overcoming rugby’s bad-boy
reputation, the sport’s ability to boost and diversify participation, and tips
on transitioning it from club to varsity.
A Rowdy Reputation
With bumper stickers and T-shirts reading “Give
Blood. Play Rugby,” it’s little wonder that the sport is looked on as one that
draws either maniacs or drunken louts. Much of that reputation is well earned.
“Rugby has certain stigmas attached to it in this country,” says Frank
Graziano, Head Coach of the women’s varsity rugby team at Eastern Illinois
University. “And it has been carrying the weight of those stigmas around for
decades. Rugby is a very social sport, and it conjures the image that when the
game is over, you roll the keg of beer onto the field and go to drinking right
away. Well, that’s not a myth. That goes on and has gone on for a very long
time at a variety of levels. It’s part of the mystique of being involved in
club rugby.”
But Graziano and others point out that reputation is very much tied to rugby’s
status as a recreational sport. You see the same thing in community softball
teams, on the golf course, and with other club sports. The good news is that
it’s a dying custom on more and more rugby teams, due, in part, to the
professionalization of the sport overseas.
“The game has changed a lot in recent years,” explains Jack Clark, Head Coach
of the varsity men’s rugby team at the University of California-Berkeley, which
won its 12th consecutive national championship in May. “You can watch real
rugby on television now, and you can see the game being played at a
professional elite level with finely tuned athletes playing for all they’re
worth. That has an effect on the recreational view of rugby. It is providing a
shining new example to follow.”
“There are probably 10 or 15 elite-type club programs [in the U.S.] on both the
men’s and women’s sides where that [partying element] is not the norm,” adds
Graziano. “And that social aspect is never going to exist at the varsity level.
None of that drinking exists in my program. What the other team does after the
game is irrelevant to us.”
Perceptions about the safety of the game also work against the sport. To the
uninitiated, rugby looks like football without pads—a recipe for disaster. And
since it’s not a sanctioned sport in the U.S., little data is available to
dispel those perceptions. But the worldwide rugby community continually
investigates ways to make the sport safer, and international data indicates
that injury rates are similar to other contact sports.
For instance, in 1995, Health Canada searched for rugby related injuries in its
Canadian Hospitals Injury Reporting and Prevention Program—a database compiling
records from 16 participating urban hospital emergency rooms. The years 1991-1994
showed that, across all ages and skill levels, of the 839 rugby injuries on the
emergency-room records, the most frequent types of injury were abrasion,
bruising, or inflammation. Only 34 cases were concussions.
U.S. coaches have witnessed similar rates in their programs. “We’ll get only
one or two concussions each season, and they are usually the light, less than
grade-one variety,” says Graziano. “More often, it’s bruises that come from
making contact with the ground.”
“We’ve seen more injuries on the football and soccer fields than we have on the
rugby field,” says John Burpoe, Athletic Director at Xavier High School in New
York City, where boys’ rugby is a varsity sport and the team ranks third in the
country. “And the only protective equipment those kids wear is a mouth guard.”
The Merits
If you can get past its perceived drawbacks,
there’s much about rugby that makes it an ideal varsity sport. Most outstanding
is the breadth of numbers, skills, and body types it accommodates.
Each team fields 15 players, and most college teams carry up to 30 on their
rosters. At the high school level, however, some teams have up to 50
athletes—opting to sponsor A, B, and C sides, which is similar to the familiar
varsity, junior varsity, freshman team setup. And the fast-paced, non-stop
nature of the game allows time for B and C teams to compete after the A match
is completed.
“An average rugby game is one and a half hours long, and that includes halftime
and injury time,” says Mattacchione. “I may have 40 players on my team and only
play 22 of them in one match. However, adding a third half to a game is common
courtesy among coaches. So the other 18 play then.
“Or, if the other team has a B-side, too, we’ll put 15 against 15 in a warm-up
or post-game match,” he continues. “The kids play at least two 20-minute
halves, enjoy a run around, and feel part of the program. So in the time it
takes to play the average football game, you’re getting in two games, and many
more athletes are given the chance to play.”
Administrators may also be attracted by the fact that, unlike many other
sports, the positions on the field (called a pitch) demand a wide range of body
types—providing athletic opportunities to a diverse group of students. “Rugby
requires a portfolio of body types,” says Clark. “You need some strong,
powerful people, some squatty people, tall beanpole players, average-size
people, players who are agile—and I think that’s very attractive.”
“Participation is a focus at this school, so that’s why rugby was a good fit
for us,” says Steve Koch, Jesuit’s Director of Athletics. “There are a lot of
kids who are successful on our rugby team who didn’t have the size, skill, or
talents to make a starting position on our football team. Now they have a sport
they can excel at, and that’s been wonderful for our kids.”
Rugby is also a very inexpensive sport to sponsor. When it comes to equipment,
the essentials are five or six balls, some cones, and uniforms. Protective gear
includes a mouth guard, although some players also like to wear scrum caps to
protect their ears. A scrum sled, which can cost up to $5,000, is valuable for
teaching players how to correctly engage in the scrum, but there are ways to
limit its expense. At Jesuit, Mattacchione purchased a generic-brand scrum sled
for only $1,400, and at Eastern Illinois, Graziano and another member of the
athletic department built their own.
At Eastern Illinois, the school provides practice uniforms, game uniforms,
travel bags, warmups, a ball for nearly every player, new cleats (called rugby
boots) for each team member almost every year, and $100 custom-made orthodontic
mouth guards. “If you add up our operating budget, the coaches’ salaries,
scholarships, and insurance, we’re close to $75,000 a year,” says Deb Polca, Senior
Associate Athletic Director at Eastern Illinois. “And that’s not expensive for
operating a sport.”
In terms of facilities, schools can make use of regulation soccer fields by
simply relining the boundaries and bringing in portable goals. Or they can
sometimes use area parks, as Xavier does. But football fields are too small,
coaches warn. “Rugby played on a football field is tight,” says Graziano. “We
run and pass, and you can’t take a game that’s played on a field 70 meters wide
and play it on a field 49 meters wide. It’s just not the same game.”
Coach Search
Although administrators who’ve transitioned
club teams to varsity status express satisfaction with the outcome, the process
isn’t without its obstacles. One is finding quality coaches.
Because most coaches in the club system are volunteers with full-time jobs in
other fields, finding a candidate with rugby experience who can also perform in
an school athletic environment is a challenge. But there are some qualities you
can look for to help ensure you find the best person available.
One is certification. USA Rugby offers coaching certification up through Level
III. Level I teaches basic principles of the game. Level II teaches game
theory, technical aspects of the sport, and practical skills. Level III covers
the roles and responsibilities of the coach.
“You also want someone who’s still actively involved in the sport,” says
Mattacchione, “whether as a player, coach, or club administrator, because they
know the rules changes, have their ear to the ground, and know what is and is
not acceptable on the field.”
But Polca warns that it’s possible for a candidate to be too close to the club
game. “I think one of the first things you want to be sure of is that your
candidates don’t buy into the stereotype about rugby—the camaraderie and so
forth,” she says. “A volunteer club coach is going to have a very different
relationship with his or her players than an interscholastic coach. You’re
looking for a person who understands that when he or she is coaching, there are
limits to what they do with the team.”
“For us, the most important thing was finding a coach who understood the
philosophy of our program and what we were trying to accomplish,” says Koch.
“We found part-time rugby coaches, but we were concerned about their
professionalism. Is it just a recreation time for them, or is the coach going
to develop the players the way we want to develop our student-athletes here?”
Opponents Anyone?
One potential complication for administrators
and coaches contemplating a move to varsity is scheduling. Since the California
men and Eastern Illinois women are the only collegiate varsity programs in the
country, and just a handful of high school varsity teams exist nationwide,
departments that introduce rugby to their varsity lineups have to be prepared
for a period of club-only competition. They must also be ready for the problems
this can pose to their coaches, athletes, and administrators.
According to Graziano, scheduling competition with club teams is one of the
most trying aspects of his job. “My schedule is technically due on December 1
prior to the following season,” he says. “But it’s impossible to meet that
deadline because there’s no way I can get the club people I work with to commit
in December to a September game for the following year. This May, for example,
I was still trying to finalize an October match.
“Part of the nightmare is that I’m not dealing with coaches,” he continues. “I
have to work with a 20-year-old student elected to be the team’s match
secretary. So athletic directors need to be a little flexible with their rugby
coaches when it comes to scheduling.”
Even when games are scheduled, Graziano has found that it’s not uncommon for
clubs to cancel matches at the last minute. “So, this year we put all the
visiting clubs under contract,” he says. “It doesn’t completely prevent them
from backing out of a match, because we didn’t put monetary penalties in there.
But it does require the club sports director’s signature and campus rec
director’s signature, not the club president’s. With these two people
responsible, they turn to their club presidents and say, ‘You will show up for
this game.’”
The other downside of scheduling an emerging sport is the travel required.
Jesuit has some club opponents nearby, but they also drive over four hours to
San Antonio to fill out their schedule. At Xavier, the rugby team competes
against squads in Washington, D.C. and Philadelphia.
At the college level, it can be even worse. Eastern Illinois, for instance, found
that most of its matches were away games because many preferred opponents
couldn’t afford to travel to Charleston, Ill. The first solution was to meet
the teams halfway on another campus. Then last season the department
experimented with a new solution that has proven even more economical.
“We decided this year, instead of paying thousands of dollars to drive to
Kansas, for example, we’d try to entice the club teams to come here every other
year and give them money toward their lodging or expenses,” says Polca. “And
like any varsity sport, the guarantee is paid after the completion of the
contest. It’s been well received by the clubs, is more economical for the
department, and allows us to balance our schedule.”
Lastly, club teams can have very loose standards on who can and cannot compete.
So high school and college administrators should realize that their
student-athletes may not necessarily be competing against only their peers.
“When you go to USA Rugby’s national tournament, there are rules and regulations
about how graduate students can participate,” says Graziano. “But for a regular
old weekend game, there’s no telling who’s going to show up.”
“When our varsity team first started,” says Koch, “there wasn’t much high
school rugby, and we played a lot of games against college-aged kids. Early on,
there were a few lopsided games, so I had to keep a closer eye on that. And if
there was a mismatch, we didn’t schedule another game with that side.”
Going Varsity
Club and varsity athletics are two very different worlds, thus the final
challenge is taking the club out of the player. The key is preparing the
athletes for the control and regulatory changes they will face as varsity
athletes.
Eastern Illinois began showing its club players what life as a varsity athlete
would be like by having each shadow a varsity athlete. And Polca spoke to the
women about the program’s vision and expectations. Still, administrators found
that old habits die hard.
“The hardest part initially was getting the students to understand that when
you’re in a varsity program, as opposed to a club, you don’t control the
decisions,” says Polca. “Club sports are run like fraternities and sororities.
A president or captain makes all the budgetary and scheduling decisions. A few
players used to that setup didn’t know how to let go of those leadership
responsibilities and instead lead in terms of motivating the team.”
In fact, when Graziano held the first team meeting, he discovered the team had
held an unauthorized practice earlier that week. What’s more, players handed
him a schedule of games they’d arranged—the first being in two weeks. The
experience made both him and Polca realize that breaking the players’ club
mentality and replacing it with varsity procedures was not going to happen
overnight.
“Even now, three years on, I’m phasing things in,” says Graziano. “For example,
this past spring was the first time I held morning practices. If I had tried 6
a.m. practice with the old club girls, they wouldn’t have come.”
What Eastern Illinois didn’t anticipate was the change players would see in
their opponents due to their varsity status. “We didn’t anticipate the jealousy
our team has faced,” says Polca. “Some places give our team a hard time—through
foul play and making fun of them as they walk by.”
Despite these challenges, administrators who’ve gone the route of adding
varsity rugby to the athletic department feel it’s been a strong addition and
hope more departments will soon follow. “I would hope some of the major NCAA
Division I schools pick this up in the near future,” says Graziano. “This
university didn’t get involved in rugby to compete against club sports. We did
it so the varsity team here would eventually play varsity teams at Illinois,
Kentucky, or Stanford.”
“We’d love to see more varsity programs,” says Koch, and we’ve had more than
our share of tournaments here to try to create interest. But it’s always a
struggle for new sports to move to high school varsity from club. We saw the
same thing in Texas with ice hockey, wrestling, soccer, and recently lacrosse.
But hopefully it will grow, because it would be a lot better for our
student-athletes to get to play other high school teams.”
But more than wanting some company, these schools say it’s a worthwhile
addition because the interest in the sport is there. “One of the first things
that made me believe adding our team was the right decision was when we went to
USA Rugby’s national collegiate tournament at Princeton our first year,” says
Polca. “There were 12 teams competing, and I was amazed at the number of women
on each team. There is interest.”
Sidebar #1: A Proud Past
Although it may be new to many of us, rugby does have a long-standing
tradition. It’s said to date back to 1823, when William Webb Ellis, a student
at Rugby in England, picked up the ball during a game of soccer and ran with
it. Since then, athletes of all origins have flocked to the sport, including
astronaut Sally Ride, who helped found Stanford’s women’s club team; basketball
pioneer James Naismith, who played as a youth in Canada; and U.S President
George W. Bush, who competed at Yale.
It’s been a professional sport on the men’s side since 1995 with its own World
Cup, and more than 90 countries currently sponsor national men’s teams,
including the United States. Women’s rugby hosted its second World Cup this
year, and the U.S. placed seventh.
Although it hasn’t been an Olympic sport since 1924, an application is
currently under review by the IOC to make rugby a participating sport in the
2008 Olympics. The USA is actually a two-time Olympic gold winner in men’s
rugby, taking the top prize at both the 1920 and 1924 Olympics.
Sidebar #2: Resources
Below are some Web sites containing information useful to departments looking
into starting rugby or in the process of transitioning a team to varsity.
www.usarugby.org
Provides information on certification courses, rules of the game, player
development camps, and youth development officers in your area, as well as USA
Rugby membership.
www.irb.org
Site of the International Rugby Board, the world governing and law-making body
for the sport. Provides information on laws of the game, and a three-level
online coaching course.
www.coachingrugby.co.uk
A comprehensive England-based site with information on how to coach the
game—from individual and team skills to nutrition and injury management.
www.rugbymag.com
In its 24th year, Rugby Magazine offers an online version of its publication
where individuals can access articles on teams, coaches, and issues facing the
sport.