Scrum trial sign of Pacific success

A burgeoning tournament for Pacific Ocean A sides includes scrums that maintain front-row contact between the 'touch' and 'set' phases, as the International Rugby Board seeks to remedy serial setpiece collapses.

After referees call touch, props permanently bind their outside arms on one another, theoretically reducing the distance and speed the two packs travel. The approach got started in this past weekend's opening leg of the Pacific Rugby Cup, comprising the second strings for Fiji, Japan, Samoa, and Tonga as well as reserve-grade teams for the Australian and New Zealand Super Rugby franchises.

Now primarily played in the Antipodes, thereby creating a sturdier economic footing, the 6-week, 27-match competition contrasts with the 10-day, 6-game Americas Rugby Championship. While both the PNC and ARC launched in 2006, the former has become a vigorous development competition, and the latter a tepid reprisal of the old Pan American Championship, little more than warmup games for the November international window.

As developing countries have all but abandoned arranging international and 'cross border' competition for themselves, improving on IRB-directed tournaments has become a primary measure of a union's effectiveness. Put another way: What opportunities are Boulder, Richmond Hill [Toronto], and the like creating for elite players that did not exist 5, 10, or 15 years ago?

Infamously, in 2009 Canada expanded its ARC representation to four teams from two, while America saw its share reduced to just one. In 2013, the PNC's expansion to Melbourne and the addition of Japan complements the scrum trial.

For nearly 100 years, forwards around the world managed their own engagements. However sensible the experiment may prove, the current woes were begat by the IRB itself, which in 2007 mandated the now-discarded crouch-touch-pause-engage sequence. As safety measures go, Dublin's efforts to reduce dangerous tackles and concussions have been more productive, with fewer unintended consequences.

'[The trial does] not quite end... the crouch, touch, set nonsense that tends to lead to early engagements or collapses, a free-kick or a penalty, but [goes] some way towards it', London's Guardian opined.

A Salt Lake City-area newspaper and TV station will narrowcast Brigham Young's home matches, the school announced last week. The tie-up is evidence of rugby moving into conventional media at the ground level.

The United States has drawn New Zealand, Canada, and Georgia at the 7s world championship this July in Russia. With the abbreviated game's joining the 2016 Summer Games, the tournament had been declared the last of a six such events; however, with only 12 teams to qualify for Rio de Janeiro, fully half of the 24 World Cup qualifiers will be left out, prompting the IRB to indicate it may reconsider.

Related: Pacific Rugby Cup wins initial praise

Comments

[You know they just want to get rid of the scrum anyway]

I don't understand how there is any material difference between "...-Pause-Engage" and "...-Set". Maybe it is one second faster.

It seems that this new deal of not withdrawing the touch won't change the distance between the front rows, but it should see an increase in pre-engagement skullduggery. I doubt that it will have any effect on injuries among experienced players (that may not be so true at lower levels of the game). However, I suspect it will wind up causing more failed scrums and restarts, etc.

[USAr at its best]

Congratulations to BYU and the other top universities for developing players because USAr is all but out of the business of doing so. Same with the TV broadcast agreement.

How will the teams like USAr's plan to host college championships at Bowling Green's open rec fields? Championship venue? If you thought Texas A&M rec fields were underwhelming and hard to get to, wait until they drive across Ohio to arrive at intramural-ville.

Team notices just went out. Buy your airline tickets, rent those vans, purchase hotel rooms and meals. Come one come all to the USAr National Championships sponsored by Emirates Airlines.

[BGSU]

The D1-AA and D2 Championships are being held in Bowling Green's soccer stadium. You will recall they hosted a Round of 16 there two years ago and it was the best championship venue USAR has had for a collegiate round of 16 in recent memory, complete with a local television station broadcasting the quarterfinal game between BGSU and Florida.

[Need more elite teams]

Penn State lost 100-0 to Cal. Is that an accurate portrayal of the gap between these two programs or did Cal take PSU's challenge personally? That score was shocking.

[Roger Mazzarella]

The Nat. College Final Four is being held in Bowling Green's Mickey Cochrane Soccer Stadium - seats 3,000, lockers rooms & showers for teams, parking is right next door, hotels right across the street, sweet 16 held there in 2011, attendance was 2,200 based on income figures. And all the games were broadcast. And yes, there are intramural fields near the stadium - lots of room for warmup. Call Florida, Maryland, Brown & Michigan and ask how they found the situation. So "USAR at its Best", you got your info where.....?

[Jack Sparrow]

Nice facilities Roger - very impressive.
But its sill in Bowling Green though!

[College #7]

Whats that saying about putting lipstick on a pig?

[Broken record in here (that happens to be right...)]

So...USAR still sucks?

[Test]

Great article is there any chance I can take it and copy it onto my own blog

[College #7]

Test = Alex Goff
Surprised you had the couresy to ask Alex, isn't that what rugby mag does all the time?

[College #7]

'courtesy'
I must have contracted the rugbymag disease just talking about them!

[Deal with it]

Which is greater each year?
a)the number of points scored by the Eagles or
b)the number of typos on rugbymag.com

[What?]

anyone see the Cal vs PSU match. PSU that weak or Cal that strong?

[Bruce Carter]

Penn State put an 89-0 drubbing on 2012 small college finalist Cal Maritime last night (Wednesday). Suggests that Penn State is a competent rugby team.

Bruce Carter

[College #7]

Cal and Life are the best teams in the country with ASU and BYU biting at their heels. Pity they won't be playing each other this year.

[East Coast is "special"]

I doubt anyone suggests that PSU is not a competent rugby team. Many teams lose 100+ to Cal. But is there any team out there doing less with their resources than PSU right now? Paid coaching, admission spots, excellent facilities, on campus field, 40k student population, excellent and affordable university. American rugby NEEDS more elite programs like Cal to produce great rugby teams and players. and it would be nice if a recognized college brand other than Cal was able to do it. so wtf is going on in happy valley?

[PSU]

If you look at the caliber of high school rugby player that PSU brings in on a yearly basis, it is not that inferior to what Cal is bringing in. So the question of why they lag so far behind Cal with all of the advantages you mention above is a reasonable one.

[answer]

@East Coast

Yes, Army is doing less with more.

Ohio State has gone from an annual top 10 team to never in the top 25.

They should be charter members of the category you're creating.

[East Coast]

Yes they should. I wouldnt say Army has the recruiting ability that PSU does though. A kid either wants to go to Army or he doesnt. Rugby probably is not going to be a major factor in that. Ohio State has admission spots and full time coaching? Then they belong in the same conversation.

[Show Me The IRB Money]

Unless something has changed recently Ohio State doesn't have admissions slots and their coaches aren't university employees.

[Danny Boy]

Navy & Army should both be in that category.

[East Coast]

Navy/Army rugby programs, just like their football programs have a ceiling. Unless top rugby recruits want to go to military academies, then they are SOL.

PSU comes close to Cal in almost every category except alumni/money. Cal has millions. PSU also probably cant get as many kids into the school as Cal can. Cal's fields/facilities are better and they are also in one of THE HS rugby hotbeds in the country. But I dont think those things that Cal has over PSU should make for a 100 point difference in a match. Is it the winter weather? is the east coast winter the big factor here? Every elite team but BYU plays in warm weather (Cal, BYU, SMC, ASU, Life)

[ecm]

While psu looked absolutely gassed (esp in 2nd half) vs smc (most teams looked gassed tho when they play the gaels...) on a warm false-spring day, monday was one cold night at witter. psu should hv been right at home on monday. Cal/byu/asu/life/smc are in a different echelon, definitely. Could be the late spring that leaves east teams playing catch-up, but its prob a bunch of factors: local recruiting base, coaching that can develop promising recruits, rugby culture committed to being the best, total commitment to fitness, a local rival playing at a high level you can benchmark your club against and strive to match ... & the weather too.

[Da Truth]

I dont know about ASU but Life, Cal, and BYU have full time coaching which makes a big difference. The part time program coaches cant compete with-cant produce the same end product-as a full time coach whose sole focus is growing their program and improving their craft.

Add admission slots that allows recruiting top HS/foreign players further widens the gap.

As stated above, the military academies like NCAA sports will get limited top recruits for obvious reasons, and no foreign based players due to citizenship.

ASU has the SA connection and anyone who knows anything realizes what a difference a few foreigners makes in terms of level of play. Same is true for BYU. I would imagine Life has a ringer or two.

And that's what separates these 4 teams from the rest of the pack. Full time coaching + top recruits = strong program.

[The growing gap]

All of which PSU has. Plus it is a better school than byu and much better school thsn life/asu. Quite the puzzle. Are top recruits really choosing schools not named cal over psu? Ferrel has freat experience and I don't think anyone would question that he isn't coaching competent rugby. Just a bad recruiter?

American rugby needs psu to be producing eagles. Flat out.

[ecm]

psu big but not fast - psu needs to get quicker.
Not quick enough vs smc or cal. No one could get around the corner.
Nifty interior pass play at pace to #12 was nifty the first couple of times but nvr worked against cal/smc - & that was best play that i saw (may hv worked against cal maritime it sounds like). Otherwise for phases, psu #9 was passing to backs catching it flatfooted w/o any forward momentum on receipt, esp in 2nd halves. They'd end up going backwards, esp on the cal game. So not fit enough nor quick enough to hang w/ the elite. Find some quickness & commit to fitness & i'd guess they'd hang better. Coaching seemed right to me on the day - head coach was engaged. The cal game was an outlier though - cal was playing with ferocity - that plus skill/strength/speed, is a tough beast to deal with. Psu was not ready for that level of commitment IMO prob cuz they havent seen it much before.

[Missing when we played the game for fun.]

Any chance the Cal was playing its 13th game of the season vs PSU its 1st or 2nd making a difference?

[Winning is fun]

Winning is fun you whiner. And you're saying that accounts for a 100-0 difference? cmon. I think it just takes time for a program to adjust to getting those kind of resources. Obviously byu/life/asu have adjusted 10x quicker but cal's had their advantages for decades and psu just got there a few years ago. maybe more time or maybe with different people they'll get there.

[Can't have your cake and eat it too....]

Army/Navy/USAFA can have foreign and have had foreign players. There was a Tongan playing for Army in the NIT, whoops I mean CRC, either last year or the year before last. By Tongan I mean a guy from Tonga not the East Bay. There is even a link (gasp!) on the West Point website: http://www.usma.edu/admissions/SitePages/Pros_Cadets_International.aspx

[East Coast]

Right...but again, a player, international or not, either really really wants to go to a rigid military academy or not.

[Deal with it]

Money, full time coaching, and recruiting are all clearly important. But fitness is also a huge factor and the easiest change to implement in any club. Many program have no idea what elite fitness looks like (especially the "keg rugby" programs). Hopefully with expansion of rugby camps and the Olympic Development Program there will be more published fitness testing results so that the rugby community will have a better understanding of how fast and strong top rugby athletes are.

[Blutarsky]

I don't think that the "keg rugby" programs are interested in the type of rugby we are talking about on this page. But they are just as important to the game and it's development as the "elite" programs.

[new day is coming]

Another good, well attended college event which has nothing to do with USAr.

Stadium, well known university rugby teams, fans, trophy.

No need for USAr travel grants, scheduling, commissioner, college director, CEO etc.

These aren't even great teams, which proves the product doesn't need to be foreign students verses long in the tooth students. For example this match outdrew Ark St vs Life 10-1.

This match was created with nothing from USAr. A local ref was more than up for the responsibility. Why do so many college teams wait for USAr to tell what they can and can't do? We need to get these leaderless tax collector out of college and high school rugby.

http://www.rugbymag.com/men's-di-college/7262-arizona-downs-notre-dame-in-parseghian-cup.html

[new day is coming]

Two D1A teams who care so little about USAr's leadership of the college games that they are more than happy to have their focus on the ACRL. The ACRL teams created the ACRL with no assistance and more importantly, no requests or permission from USAr.

These D1A teams don't care where USAr ranks their conference (D1A-D1AA) because they aren't even planning to participate in the USAr national championships. Their conference championship which they own, not USAr, is their collective focus, along with the possibility of a bowl game down the road.

VTech qualified for the USAr college 7's this past Fall and declined, choosing the non-USAr owned CRC as their preferred college 7's national championship. Navy has selected the Varsity Cup as their Spring XV national championship. Both teams signaling they are joining the group of well know college teams which are done with USAr's management of college rugby.

As discussed on the RM pod cast, Navy has the full weight of the Naval Academy behind their hosting of a double-header Varsity Cup quarter-final to be held at Navy-Marine Corps Stadium. USAr has never had an event staged at this perfect for rugby stadium. It now appears they never will as colleges go their separate ways from USAr.

At what point do college teams not interested or not intending to participate in the USAr championships stop paying taxes to USAr? At what point are these tax funds invested back into the college game instead of funding salaries of employees doing nothing for the growth of the game?

http://www.rugbymag.com/men's-di-college/7264-navy-tested-by-hokies-but-victorious-nonetheless.html

[invest in rugby not the Boulder staff]

A million dollars in ANNUAL college dues to USAr gets college rugby nothing but poor ineffective management.

What if this million dollars was invested locally each year back into college rugby? Tens of thousands of local-regional dollars target invested in what the teams know would bring them return on investment. Nationally, a million dollars per year invested, year after year, back into the college game.

Do you think college rugby would miss paying the salaries of the Todd Bell's, Rich Cortez, Kevin Battle, Tam Brekenridge? Or a whole office full of Boulder employees. What does a $275k CEO do for college rugby? Zero. Then why are college kids funding his salary? If these people didn't exist would college rugby be worse off? No, college rugby wouldn't miss them a bit. College rugby wouldn't know they were gone. These well meaning staffer haven't done a thing for college rugby. Every positive thing happening in college rugby is being done outside these employees.

What if the USAr Board of Directors didn't assign a Board member to look after college rugby? Boy, this would be rough, NOT!

Why is USAr charging high school and college students for the right to play the game? Why are these students required to subsidize insurance rates for adults and the national team?

Change of direction is needed.

[Deal with it]

Agree that strong conference administration will make a difference in the development of rugby. Some conferences have been trying to arrange regional TV deals on their own. The conferences can work together(some already are)to organize interesting and profitable cross conference match-ups. A USAR National Championship is not needed to grow the game. American football makes plenty of money from conference and bowls and develops many elite athletes without a national playoff system.

[good question]

why does USAR charge to play? we pay for ref separately. we pay for coaching courses separately. I understood insurance was only a small percentage of the total dues amount. are we really requiring students to pay for union salaries?

[Danny Boy]

The only thing that is stopping some conferences from leaving USAR altogether is the referee situation. If they solve this, then you watch the exodus.

[pay them they are not USAR's slaves]

pay the refs. create a pool of good refs that agree to assignments through the ref managers. this needs to be a pay for services arrangement where the refs get paid for the service.

[Deal with it]

USAR doesn't provide many details on their collections and spending. Well managed conferences could encourage their members to hold off paying their CIPP until they get the answers they want. CIPP Sequester (CIPP-quester)

[calling the IRS]

USAR is never going to show what they do with the money in any detail. Just large categories of spending, no real information. This is because its all a bad sham, which will only be fully understood once this administration is replaced.

[Deal with it]

@calling the IRS
The IRS and the Department of Treasury have no problem with USA Rugby.

http://usarugby.org/documentation/foundation/USAR%20Charitable%20Found%20IRS%20Determination%20Letter%201-3-12.pdf

The only people who can force change at USA Rugby are the members and conferences. If the members and the conference don't act then nothing will change.

[Danny Boy]

Even if you pay the refs, where do you replace them, train them and help them to become better? Without it coming through USAR there will be no support from the IRB down. The refs are the key, I just don't know it would work unless every conference did the same thing.

A mass boycott of Cipp dues on 1st August would leave them in a pretty pickle though!

[pay the ref's]

The full ref cost should be paid by the teams, which includes a fee for the ref. This includes ref managers and development. This is a cost the teams should pay. Even if the development fee is paid to USAr.

This is better than paying USAr a million dollars in dues which they waste on themselves.