On national championships

'What has USA Rugby been doing for 30 years?', an IRB consultant asked me several summers ago.

We have spent a lot of time on domestic championships, running them in dozens of categories and divisions across a continental nation. We are pretty good at them, particularly for an 'amateur' country, I replied.

Perhaps I was wrong. Last month's announcement that the union did not have acceptable hosting bids in 9 of 13 categories and so was extending the application window is a worrying sign. (So too that some bidders haven't heard back from Boulder and so are left in the dark.)

To the extent that their rugby is not strictly recreational, most Americans play the game in pursuit of a team championship, not representative honors. We know this because CIPP dues are paid most faithfully by teams in the title hunt; budding youth teams resent the dues redirected to senior all-start programs and local administrators want their money to 'stay at home.'

One of the bigger growth spurts in American history was the mid-90s expansion of playoff qualifiers, which dramatically increased the number of teams participating but also increased USARFU's reliance on volunteer, club-based event management (as opposed to clerical eligibility procedures which the territories had always done). But it seems to have become less attractive to host Boulder's events.

This isn't terribly surprisingly, given the union's habit of staging international events on the same day as domestic championships or the jamboree approach to clustering competitions which deserve their own moment in the sun.

Whatever else may be said of the 'old' board, that crew knew the terrain very well and diligently worked to execute and enhance the national championship structure. The same cannot be said of the present board, many of whom have little significant experience in the domestic game.

Related:
    Who made qualifier-Cape Fear call?
    On jamboree events, redux
   

Comments

[College Playoffs]

A national competition is great, but let's do it sensibly. I can speak for college rugby because that is where I am involved. Let's get 4 regional winners determined by a playoff system that sees the teams play on college campuses on a 1 match per weekend schedule and then have a final 4 playing on Thursday (or Friday) and Sunday at one of our premiere college rugby grounds (Stanford, Cal, Army, etc). Simple and cost effective for the college teams. I know last year there were teams that traveled across the country to play a team that was 500 miles away from them. That is just stupid.

[Rock On]

Kurt:

Rock on dude, your post (again) says it well. These guys running the union have trampled all over our national championships and long serving tournaments with the utmost arrogance.

We might not have invented rugby, but that doesn't mean we (domestic players and coaches) don't know what we are doing. We got on okay without a foreign USA Rugby overpaid executive and expensive Irish coach, and I believe we will be even better once they too flee to an easier gig.

Keep rocking Kurt. Rocking in America !

[USAss Rugby]

Yeah! Bring back some home grown USA administrative talent! Like Doug Arnot!!!

oh....

[college]

Wait. How long has the new board been in place? You're telling me the championships/playoffs system was different before that? Wasnt it just 4 years ago?

Anyways, as much as Im down on USA Rugby, if they, by the end of this year contract 10 national players and set out a good plan for the college game that is going to work I will say Im impressed.

[Joe]

When has USA ever been good at hosting national championships? I've been on both sides of the coin in that I have participated in them and help run them. I've been to high school, college, and men's championships and a test match and I have never seen one to be proud of. USA rugby stinks at events. They enslave local volunteers who are dumb enough to want to host one of the events, and they take all the profits. Show up way understaffed, and the venues are awful. Not to mention that they are rarely consistent (e.g. the round of 16 must be on a college campus, no wait we want everyone together in New Mexico, no wait college campus). It hasn't change any under the new board. The events still suck. The logistics are mind boggling and the management poor.

[serzhantovo]

this is totally off subject but I haven't heard squat about it, so someone chime in. The IRANZ workshops put on by the former All Blacks and others--did that come off this year or not? Thanks.

[Competitons Review]

I will remind everyone that for the last 4 years we were to have done a competitions review both in the now almost dated and never used strategic plan and NM's new scorecards from at least 2008 - this review would have looked at each division and said amongst many other things, how do you grow, and are/is a national championship part of that need.

Why was this stopped, who is accountable for not doing?

[All Black fan]

Serzhantovo,

The IRANZ camps came and went. I think they are due to come back next year, but as a more private course put on by the Glendale group.

After the big USAR announcement of a partnership (USARs words) between IRANZ and USAR, Melville didn't keep his end of the deal.

USAR didn't do any of the marketing they had promised. The day the IRANZ camp opened our best young college players left the country on tour. Melville also held age grade camps the week before, meaning our under college age players would have needed to stay in Colorado for a month.

Just another USAR agreement gone bad.

[No pod cast fan]

Anyone catch the McLane show? Ray and Bruce trip all over themselves asking EOS and NM questions.

Bruce's questions are four times longer than the answer. I think Bruce is mainly trying to tell everybody what he thinks he knows.

There isn't even a agreement yet to contract our 7's players and he's asking the deal points of the not yet agreed contract. Melville was pulling out his hair trying to be polite. When Nigel makes you look bad, you really are.

[Lindsay Tiernan]

Greetings -

Just a note from Boulder: Losing Dan Payne and Court Jeske in the events department has caused a bit of a shuffle with the workload. We extended the process to make sure every potential host was not only aware that these events were available but that they had someone to contact in case they had questions or concerns. We are very satisfied with all the bids we’ve received and will be in touch with hosts as soon as possible. If anyone has any questions regarding the bid or selection process, please feel free to contact me directly – ltiernan@usarugby.org.

Thank you -
Lindsay

[pick an excuse any excuse]

Note to Lindsay...call the bidders to explain what the hell Boulder is doing.

BTW, Jeske left many months ago and Payne worked last weekend, that's a poor excuse for not having this done.

I would use Nigel's poor economy excuse, if he hasn't wore it out.

[that's not my name]

From what I heard IRANZ was a mad scramble. They cut it in half - course time and cost.

Not enough players and not the quality of coaches expected.

Timing was horrible.

It should be every three years and it should also be linked with
High Performance USA Coaching. IE if it is quality.

The only problem with this is: we never hear what kind of program it is for the coaches - other than the sales talk of the course presenters.

Now that's not a shot at IRANZ, that's what is expected from them.

What about the coaches that took the course in NZ or S Africa - worth it? Has anyone ever asked them? And not one or two guys - how many US coaches have taken this course overseas?

The US cost initally was
3500 + travel costs and 16+ days away from work/family - pretty steep

IRANZ problem is there aren't that many coaches in the states that are qualified to take this course on a yearly basis.

But Glendale needs to make money, so who knows what IRANZ was promised???