Archived News

NCYRU RUGBY BALL
November 8, 2012

Dear Rugby Enthusiasts,

Thank you to all those who attended the first annual NCYRF Rugby Ball. It was such a wonderful evening of good company, food, drink at such a nice venue, The Van Landingham Estate. And the new fund NCYRF, founded this year to support the NCYRU in its efforts to support and grow youth rugby in North Carolina, even made some money through the event's ticket sales as well as from some direct donations.
USA ARC TEAM NAMED

Written by RUGBYMag Staff - Thursday, 20 September 2012 16:01   

BOULDER, CO-- USA Rugby MNT Head Coach Mike Tolkin has announced his squad for the 2012 Americas Rugby Championship to be held in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada on October 12^th through 20^th. The USA Selects will consist of 25 (mostly) domestic-based players competing against teams representing Canada, Argentina and Uruguay.

Joe Cowley for Life. Pat Clifton photo.

  Raleigh Rugby Football Club Coach Certification Workshop

UPDATE on USA Rugby Level I Coach Certification held in Raleigh, NC on August 25^th and 26^th:

Congratulations are in order for a total of (16) new certified USA Rugby coaches from rugby clubs across North Carolina, South Carolina and  Virginia.

These gentlemen studied and performed various coach workshop activities for two full days this past weekend at the Eastern Wake Fire and Rescue Squad and the Raleigh Rugby pitch facilities in what was a very successful USA Rugby coach certification clinic.

Represented were coaches from Sherman University, Western Carolina University, Virginia Tech, Raleigh Youth Rugby, Fayetteville Youth Rugby, Camp Lejeune and the Chapel Hill Highlanders just to name a few.

Sean Reese and Brad Chapman from the new Fayetteville youth club(s) received their Level 200 certifications and very proud that they took the time and effort to champion this course. Look for good things from the Fayetteville area and please support these folks.

Special kudos and appreciation to the Chapel Hill Highlanders for sending a total of (7) enthusiastic coach participants to the clinic. That was almost half of the class!

Congratulations again to what was truly a great clinic. A lot of very useful information was shared amongst the coaches on all accounts.

Stay tuned for information on future coach clinics in the Raleigh area. We may opt for a Level II- Developing Rugby Skills course in October 2012.

Tommy Myatt 

NCYRU Junior Rugby Representative

https://ncyru.org/default.aspx

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Tigers rugby club finds early success

Rugby has been growing in popularity and will be arriving in the Olympics in 2016.

There are several rugby clubs in Charlotte.

Just two years old, the Charlotte Tigers Rugby Club is a two-time North Carolina state champion and they placed second at the USA U19 7s championship in June. The Tigers also won the U19 division at the Cape Fear Rugby 7s Tournament in Wilmington in July.

A few high schools in Charlotte have rugby club teams. That’s why South Mecklenburg junior Parker Stroud and his mom, Meredith, created this team two years ago.

The team found two coaches with high-level rugby experience from playing in South Africa: Riann Van Schalkwyk and Graeme Bosch.

One of the main goals for the Tigers is to keep costs to a minimum so that rugby can be accessible to anyone who wants to join.

Unlike equipment-heavy sports like lacrosse, baseball, and football, one of the charms of rugby is that it’s a simple game to pick up.

“It’s cheaper here,” said Parker Stroud. “You just need cleats, a mouth guard, and a ball.”

But because there is a lack of padding with such a physical sport, some are hesitant to fully embrace rugby.

“Unfortunately, I think rugby has a stigma attached to it,” said Meredith Stroud, the team’s secretary. “People think it’s just a free-for-all out on the field, and it frightens parents.”

There are fewer injuries in rugby than there are in football, according to Meredith and Van Schalkwyk, thanks to rules regulating the ways you can tackle.

The Tigers draw from several schools including South Mecklenburg, Marvin Ridge, Butler, Ardrey Kell, and Providence High. The Tigers’ players do a range of other sports, from football to soccer to martial arts.

Even though just a handful of players had even picked up a rugby ball before, the team was quick to catch on to the intricacies of the sport. Van Schalkwyk noted that he struggles to get his players to return to football after rugby.

One reason for that, he thinks, is because in football, the quarterback is the only player that gets to make decisions as to where the ball goes. But in rugby, every player gets to touch the ball.

“It’s just a lot more fun (that football)… the game doesn’t stop every two seconds,” said Tigers vice captain Anthony Santelle. “It’s a lot more friendly; not everybody’s trying to kill each other.”

Santelle touched on something the entire team seemed to value – camaraderie. There’s a sense of family in the team, something that has drawn the players together.

Parker Stroud said that rugby isn’t about “who can get the star player.

“If we have one less person on the field, we’re in trouble,” he said. “We need every single person.”

Parker, Anthony and many more players will be graduating in two years, and the core of this Tigers team will be gone. Sustainability is essential to this club and Van Schalkwyk stressed that he wanted to build a foundation for the next three to five years.

With that in mind, the club partnered with Charlotte Junior Rugby Association to recruit middle school players to future Tigers teams.

The Charlotte Tigers Rugby Club has only been around for two years and when the sport gets more exposure, the club hopes it isn’t too long before the sport gets more attention in Charlotte.

Tigers 2nd in National HS 7s Tournament in Philadelphia

Well done to the Charlotte Tigers for a great showing in Philadelphia, reaching the finals of the USA U19 7s championship, where they narrowly lost to Pride from DC.

Pride Perfect in Philadelphia, PPL Park 

RUGBYMAG.com - Written by Pat Clifton -    Sunday, 03 June 2012 14:54  

Pride of Washington, DC won the High School Rugby Challenge final 19-5 over South Mecklenburg (N.C.) in front of thousands of fans at PPL Park in Chester, Pa., capping off a six-game, three-day unbeaten streak.  

“We’ve been very focused on 7s for the last 12 years. Essentially, we realized we were always going to struggle with size and getting kids up to speed, so we’ve always done summer 7s, always done summer camps to decrease the learning curve.

“Our kids love 7s. They love the open style of it. It’s more akin to like three-on-three basketball. They get to show their moves and their style and I think they really enjoy that.”

IRB LAW CHANGES

Please see the following documents for recent law changes. These changes come into effect this summer.

LAW CHANGES WITH EXPLANATIONS - USA RUGBY

 LAW CHANGES - IRB

You can find additional information about refereeing on our referee's page or contact the NCYRU Referee Co-ordinator -

Charlotte Catholic placed 5th in National Invitational

5th isn't 1st but it's Still Important

RUGBYMAG.com - Written by Alex Goff  -    Saturday, 19 May 2012 06:22  

There is nothing wrong with 5^th place.

In fact, at the national high school tournaments, a 5^th-place team can often make a solid argument that they deserve to be ranked higher, especially if their only loss is to the eventual champions.

In eight-team, multi-bracket playoffs, only one team finishes 3-0 (the champions, of course), but three teams come out of the gauntlet 2-1, the team that finishes 2^nd, the team that finishes 3^rd, and the team that finishes 5^th.

Fifth matters.

Charlotte Catholic is playing for 5^th in the single-school after edging a hard-bitten Brownsburg team 11-10 Friday. Like all the teams playing for 5^th, Catholic lost their opening match – in this case a 10-3 heartbreaker to Penn, who are now in the final.

“The first thing we talked about after the first game, and we knew we had a lot of young guys who are having their first experience here, that it’s time to stand up,” said Catholic Head Coach Brendan Keane. “After a loss, and a tough loss at that, who’s going to be counted?”

It was a hugely physical game against a Brownsburg team playing for the memory of their coach, Jeremy Strange, who died in March after his truck was hit by a train. The Brownsburg, now playing for 7^th, was drained after the match.

“One kick was the difference in the game,” said Keane. “Brownsburg is a very good team, a very tough team. We were beaten by a kick in the semi last year, and we learned from that. We worked on those things, about how to close out a game. I was glad the guys took that on.”

Catholic was led by outside center Jackson Krone, who superb on defense, but the unsung heroes were prop Murphy Swancy, who picked his game up considerably in the second match and covered the field well, and lock Jacob Brannon and flanker Brady Smith.

“You don’t see their numbers very often because they’re usually on the ground, working hard,” said Keane.

Meanwhile on the other side of the single-school bracket,  size-challenged St. Thomas Aquinas team came back to beat Snow Canyon 14-10. Snow Canyon, from Utah, looked the bigger and had some very fast kids, but some desperate tackling by the Kansas City-area team held things close, and then Brendan Nachbar scored a try in each half to get the win for the Saints.

“I think they got tired and we started to spread out instead of everyone getting sucked to the ruck,” said Aquinas coach and former USA prop Tim Kluempers. “And our guys may be littler but we’re just one man, one tackle. They manned up and smashed ‘em. That’s what we try to teach them. Get in their face, don’t let them get any yardage.”

Kluempers said it was a team effort on defense, but also mentioned flyhalf Nachbar, and center Zach Martinez as “beasts” on defense.

“Nachbar was by far the man of the match,” said Kluempers.

“Our forwards have a lot of heart, and they’re smart,” said Kluempers. “We try to work on not just ‘you have to ruck’ but also, why you have to.”

And finishing 5^th is big.

“Every game you play at this level is important,” said Kluempers. “Not only for the reward for coming in 5^th, but also to come away with two wins. Two wins at this level is hard.”

“Winning 5^th is big,” said Keane, whose team finished 4^th the last two years. “We came here with the goal of winning a national championship, so losing that first game was a big let-down. I told the boys they had two minutes to grieve, and then job #2. The goal we then set was, we’ve never won two games at nationals, so now we have a new goal.”

Myers Park and Charlotte Take South Titles

RUGBYMAG.com - Written by Alex Goff  -    Saturday, 23 May 2012 10:28 

Myers Park rugby club won the South Boys High School title this past weekend, coming back from a 10-0 deficit to defeat New Orleans Jesuit.

The North Carolina team actually got into the South playoffs because Charlotte Catholic had opted to accept an invitation to the USA Rugby national tournament. Myers Park lost only twice all season, 9-0 against Charlotte Catholic when they kept getting into penalty trouble, and 27-26 to HS club team West Mecklenburg.

                                      Tired but happy. Myers Park post-match.

On Saturday, Myers downed the Pope Greyhounds 57-0, and then Providence 17-0. New Orleans Jesuit beat the game teams, 62-10 over Pope and 49-5 over Providence.

It wasn’t until the first half of the final that they gave up any points.

“We came out cocky,” said Myers Park coach Frank McKinney. “We needed to show better discipline. We talked at halftime and just said, we have expectations, and we are going to do it. We just need to execute.”

Led by captain and flyhalf Colin Frazier, who has been a four-year starter for the team, Myers Park began to come back. Frazier set up outside center Marlon Pritchard for a try early in the second half, and with Frazier’s conversion the score stood 10-7.

The captain’s leadership was important at this point. On the front foot Myers Park started to get penalties. It was Frazier who prevented some rash quick taps, pointed to posts and slotted a penalty to tie the game. The team then saw how it would all fall into place.

Consistent pressure from Myers Park put New Orleans Jesuit under the gun, and produced two more Frazier penalties for the 16-10 win.

“Jesuit is an outstanding team,” said McKinney. “But I was very pleased with how our kids came back, and the toughness they showed.”

Meanwhile the Charlotte Tigers (pka South Mecklenburg) won the HS club bracket in a very competitive competition.

The Tigers beat Greer 29-22 while the Trojans of Florida beat Tennessee’s South Doyle 38-14 in the semis.

In an excellent game played in hot weather, the Tigers outlasted the Trojans 33-21.