The Eagle High boy’s rugby team has been a program at Eagle High for many years. Although they are recognized as Eagle athletes in the rugby world, Eagle High doesn’t recognize the team as a school sanctioned sport. Because of that, they are self-funded and aren’t allowed to practice on Eagle High’s campus. Eagle Rugby has multiple achievements and is known for being a competitive high school program.
Rugby favors all shapes and sizes of people. Each team is typically split into two, Forwards and Backs. A Forward is known for being big, strong and physical. A Back is known for being smaller, fast and shifty.
“The sport of rugby is the best sport I’ve ever played. The team is really great, environment is amazing, I have really good friends [and] I just love it,” said junior Owen Snyder. Traditionally, a jersey number correlates to the position of the athlete in rugby and in other sports.
“I play fly half, I’m the 10,” Snyder said. Snyder is a Back. He is fast and distributes the ball across the field. He is very passionate about the sport.
“If it were to be sanctioned, it would be a lot better. We could practice at the school, and we would be more associated with the school,” Snyder said.
Rugby is not nearly as well-known as other sports in America. It is an intense contact sport, played on a grass or turf field. The players walk onto the pitch with just their jersey, shorts, mouthguard and cleats. Players don’t wear padding or a helmet. However, it is optional to wear a scrum cap, which is a small fabric padded helmet.
The rules are unique. Rugby always uses a running clock. There are no time outs or injury time. If a player is injured, the athletic trainers typically run onto the field to help mid-play.
There are two main styles of rugby: Sevens and 15’s. The rules are the same for both styles. The difference is, in Sevens there are seven players from one team on the field and seven players for the other team, making 14 players on the field. The game is only 15 minutes long. In 15’s, there are 15 players from each team on the field, making 30 players overall. The games are almost 80 minutes in total. For high school rugby, Sevens is in the fall and 15s is in the spring. Neither season is sanctioned by West Ada or recognized by Eagle High.
The sport of rugby is so complex, but these students continue to remain dominant in their sports and academics. These Eagle athletes put so much effort into their team and community; they deserve for the community to pour effort back into them.
Eagle has had a 15s team for years now, but recently Eagle has enough players to have a Sevens team in the fall. Sevens is a fast-growing sport; more and more players join teams every year.
“In the past, the Sevens team was a combination of schools. They were all combined into a team called TOA,” said senior Casey Hulse. Student athletes from schools across the West Ada School District would join together and travel to compete against other rugby teams.
The teams would play friendly matches with local teams because it was more of a club than a school sanctioned sport.
“Practices are Mondays through Wednesdays and then we get together Thursdays and competed against other teams,” Hulse said. Their practices are at Eagle Middle, and most of their games take place there.
Rugby is known as a “gentleman’s game”, even though it is so hard fought and physical. At the end of every match, the boys from both teams, win or lose, wrap their arms around each other and celebrate the beautiful game of rugby that was just played. This tradition at the end of rugby games is called the “man of the match”, where the captains from each team recognize one Forward and one Back to highlight their success during the game.
These players want their efforts to be recognized considering the hours that they put in throughout the season. Rugby requires grit from these Eagle High students to showcase their talent. They want to be noticed from the district so the team can have more competition and more benefits.
