Men's D1 College Games This Weekend; Serious Warmups
It's early days in the college rugby fall but we've got some activity already.
We're listing D1A, NCR D1, and D1AA teams all together because they're playing each other, especially during non-conference time ... which is now. What we will do is label each team as to where they are competing ... as follows:
CRAA D1A: Black Bold
NCR D1: Green
NCR D1AA: Blue
D1AA in CRAA or ACR: Red
Trinity, the rugby team at Dublin University, just hosted Notre Dame and Navy, and now they send players to the Midwest to play Indiana and Ohio State on the same day. Trinity has something like five teams so they can handle the two games. This will be a really good opening challenge for both teams. Likely we'll see a more polished Trinity side handle both Big 10 teams, who will want to impose themselves physically.
Men D2 2023 Rankings Week 1
Let's be honest here, we're making a guess.
Right now this is a starting point based on last year, and a little sense of what's going to happen this year.
We do make the attempt to talk to coaches about what they have, but what that often ends up with a "well, we'll see" answer. And if we only get some background information from a few teams, but from others, it can actually skew the rankings. So we're using what we have and we're making a few guesses.
Most importantly in these rankings will be the results. There are some rare crossover games and we're looking forward to any of those. But for the most part these teams play within their conferences, so there isn't much crossover. It comes down to us to figure out which competition is stronger.
NCR D1 Fall 2023 Rankings Week 1
We're opening up the fall rankings season with our NCR D1 Top 20.
Why a top 20? Because there aren't quite enough teams to do a Top 25. That's OK, it makes it more exclusive in some way.
A couple of things about this: It's really a guess each year especially in the opening week, so the results will make the changes for us. Also, we don't tend to look at NCR's own power rankings, so we have no idea if these are the same or different or what. By avoiding other rankings we keep these rankings at GRR more fresh.
Making Changes in the Rankings
A Look at Contenders As D2 Opens Up
As we mentioned last week, the men’s D2 college playoff picture is a lot more open to student-supported club teams this year.
The last few years of play have led to NCR taking a fairly strong stand on school-supported teams and teams from colleges with large enrollments, saying they need to compete in D1AA or D1. Given that the last four national D2 champions and 10 of the 16 semifinalists could be considered large-school or school-supported teams, you can see why they there was a call for NCR to do something about it.
So the 100 or so Men’s D2 teams are almost entirely (but not quite) self- or alumni-funded. We take a look at a small number of contenders this year and wonder if they could be the first D2 champion under the new definition.
GRR D1A Rankings 2023-24 Week 1
With the changing and shifting collegiate landscape, we've tried a number of different collegiate rankings and we think we've finally settled on a plan.
We've combined D1A and NCR D1. We've combined D1A, NCR D1, and D1AA. We've moved and then separated it. We've ranked based on seasonality. It's been a bit of an experiment the last couple of years. Well we've reached some conclusions.
D1AA Questions
The key conclusion over the last couple of years is that the argument that "there's overlap between D1AA and D1A" is essentially over. You might get one or two D1AA teams capable of beating the odd D1A team, but in terms of the difficulty of the season, as well as overall ability, there's not real contest—Virginia Tech showed that by going winless in the Rugby East last year and then winning NCR's D1AA playoff.
Ashfield New Director of Rugby at Stanford
Rich Ashfield has been named Director of Rugby at Stanford University.
Ashfield, who has been serving as interim Head Coach of the USA Women's 15s National Team, will be overseeing operations for both the men's and women's teams at Stanford.
For the past seven years Ashfield worked under previous Director of Rugby Josh Sutcliffe as an assistant coach. Before that he coached Providence College women and the Beantown women's club, as well as working as an assistant at Brown.
He has been on the USA WNT staff since 2013.
St. Joe's Youngsters Show Well in Opener
A very young St. Joseph's University squad defeated Villanova in a warmup game over the weekend.
The game was a series of three 30-minute periods and SJU ended up ahead 40-12 after all was said and done.
Junior prop Akindele Oladeji was the only non-freshman to score points. Wing Adam Hartman touched down two, while flanker Tommy Bonner, No. 8 Brian Donahue, and lock Christian Sabella also scored for SJU.
The Hawks have a very young squad overall with one one senior seeing time against Villanova.
According to forwards coach Connor Hohman, the freshmen have looked impressive in training and while the experienced players are good, too, SJU will need that depth through a tough MARC season.
Who Plays What and Where in Men's College Rugby
As the 2023-24 men's collegiate season opens we figured it would be a public service to let you know what you, or the team you follow, is playing for.
As you probably know by now, there is a major collegiate organization that does not pay dues to USA Rugby, which is National Collegiate Rugby (NCR). When the NCR teams play within their own world that doesn't present complications—you don't have to be a member of USA Rugby to actually play a game of rugby—but it does when those teams. want to play USA Rugby members. That's because USA Rugby wants their members to play teams that are covered by their insurance. What that means is a bunch of NCR memberships also pay for the USA Rugby membership.
Michigan Rolls in Warmup vs Cincinnati
University of Michigan and University of Cincinnati got an early warmup for their fall seasons, meeting up in Ohio on a very warm day.
Michigan controlled the pace of the game nicely with sophomore wing Tommy Hamann finding plenty of space and scoring four tries on the day as Michigan ran out 61-5 winners.
New Head Coach Christian Mentzer, who has taken over from Matt Trenary, who is now Director of Developemnt, was happy with the start.
"This team has been working hard for two weeks in preparation for this game," said Mentzer. "While there are many things we need to improve, the heart and intensity our guys displayed is something we can be proud of. Respect to Cincinnati for being such gracious hosts."
Navy Shuts Out Notre Dame in Match held in Dublin
DUBLIN, Ireland - The journey for the Navy men’s rugby team (1-0) to defend its national championship began on a high note with a 78-0 victory against Notre Dame (0-1) on Friday in Dublin, Ireland.
The Mids scored 12 tries in the match, which is their second-most tries scored in a single game. Additionally, Navy’s 78 points are its most scored in a match since its victory against The Citadel (88-0) last September.
“We are happy with where we are for our first game of the season. We have been working hard to try to ensure we hit the ground running and we did that,” said Director of Rugby Gavin Hickie. “ There are a lot of areas for us to clean up and improve, which we will, but for now, we are happy with our performance in Ireland.”
Changes Open Up Men's D2 College for Fall 2023
The Men’s D2 college playoffs this fall will look quite different from 2022 or 2021.
Oh, sure, the actual number of teams won’t be all that much different, but who those teams are will be.
NCR Finalizes Championship Dates, Venues for 2023-24
Consider the 2021 final four, in which Thomas More, Northern Iowa, Norwich, and Adrian faced off. Both Adrian and Thomas More are now in higher divisions. In fact, of the 20 teams entered into NCR’s D2 playoffs, at least five are now in higher divisions.
In 2022, two more final four teams found ended up moving up a division over this summer. Over the past two years seven playoff teams are now no longer in D2.
Navy, Notre Dame Face Off in Dublin
University of Notre Dame and the US Naval Academy will play a rugby game in Ireland as something of a pre-amble to the much-hyped football game between the two institutions this weekend.
With the Mishipmen and Fighting Irish set to fave off at Aveva Stadium on Saturday, in a somewhat smaller venue the rugby teams will meet on Friday at Trinity College, Dublin University.
The Fighting Irish rugby team has already landed in Ireland and will be enjoying a packed couple of days with training, cultural trips, a tour of Dublin, and Catholic mass at Dublin Castle.
It's a challenging opening game for Notre Dame as they face the defending national champion Midshipmen. And while Navy has graduated several key performers, they remain a formidable side.
Book Review: Brotherhood. When West Point Rugby Went to War
In the spring of 2002 Army West Point Rugby toured the UK, playing, among other teams, Rosslyn Park.
Martin Pengelly was in that game, playing second row for Rosslyn Park, and remembers it fondly. As time went on, Pengelly became a journalist, now writing for the Guardian and keeping a close journalistic eye on the American rugby scene. And he wondered what had happened to that Army team. It was, after all, the first West Point class to graduate after the 9/11, 2001 terrorist attacks. A class that knew it was going to war.
In 2015 Pengelly penned a touching and intense article that took a look at that 2002 rugby team and how love of the game, love of their mission, and tragedy linked them all. Now that remembrance has become a book: Brotherhood. When West Point Rugby Went to War.
MLR Draft First Round Roundup
Someone is starting to listen.
More teams were looking for tight five players but also taking a sht at a young, American flyhalf in the MLR draft.
Here is the list of first round picks:
St. Bonaventure Skipper Rick Rose is MLR #1 Draft Pick
Rick Rose of St. Bonaventure is the #1 pick in the 2023 Major League Rugby draft, getting the nod from expansion club Miami.
Rose was the captain of St. Bonaventure, leading them to a NCR D1 title in the fall of 2021. The 6-7 lock is a powerful forward on defense, wins lineouts, is an excellent leader, and someone who puts in a ton of work around the park.
A four-year player at St. Ignatius HS in Cleveland, Rose as a freshman was not exactly a standout. But, according to his HS Head Coach Dan Arbeznik he resolved to work hard to make himself stronger, fitter, and more able to handle himself on the rugby field. His extra work, coupled with a startling growth spurt that saw him shoot up about a foot-and-a-half in his final three years, turned him into a major force on the rugby field.
