Florida Collegiate Season Opens With New Contenders

01.26.2026College Men

USF players with the "Gozilla!" pose after beating FAU.

Author: Alex Goff

It's a new season for the Florida Collegiate Conference, and since last year's conference champs (and, ultimately, CRAA D1AA champs) St. Thomas has moved up to D1A, things are more wide open.

Major challenger Florida State, which fell to STU in the conference final last year, opened their season with a 28-14 win over University of Florida.

Head Coach Michael Gomez has one of the largest D1AA rosters in the game, and he works hard to get all of those players match time. The result is several games on a weekend, often against different teams.

This week the FSU C-side played Florida's B-side and lost 22-21. The FSU Bs, including five freshman starters, took on the Gainesville men's side and won 36-25. This is a major reason by the Seminoles keep players in the program—everyone gets a chance to play.

As for the A-side match, FSU ran out to a 21-0 lead at halftime, but had to deal with a knee injury to captain and leading player Danny Bennett. No word yet on how long he will be out, but it will llikely be a while.

Florida worked their way back into the game and FSU found themselves playing defense much of the second half.

Still, they hung on well.

The new team in the competition is Millennia Atlantic University, which won the D2 league last year and showed well at the CRAA D1AA 7s in the spring. The Macaws are a school-supported program with a good group of players who have solid rugby backgrounds.

MAU won comfortably over Central Florida 52-5 to open their league season. The Macaws got tries from Juan Ignacio Fernandez, Santiago Ponce, Trivun Muncey, and Nahuel Ricardes, while the 8-9 combo of Manuel Garcia Luque and Aubin Gratadoux helping cap off numerous scoring chances.

Gratadoux managed the team superbly.

"Overall, we definitely have a lot to improve on," said Head Coach Jaled Gunum. "But we believe getting more game time and consistency in this division will help us grow and tighten things up."

South Florida beat Florida Atlantic 54-7 in another one-sided game. USF saw eight different players score and were led well by No. 8 Barrett Joy along with vice captain and flyhalf Joey Thornton. Along with his game management, Thornton was 6-for-7 on conversion kicks.

With props Mike Torowus and Nicholas Cassie controlling the gainline (Torowus on attack and Cassie off the bench with his defense), and center Danny Feliciano-Munoz dynamic in attack, the Bulls have to be feeling good about their chances this season.