Friday Moves On. What Next?
Friday Moves On. What Next?
Who should replace Mike Friday?
Now that the longtime USA Men's 7s Head Coach has confirmed what we all expected and stepped down from the job after 10 years, we've got to consider who will take on the job.
First, through, a nod to Friday. It's tough to be a coach of a national team for 10 years and it takes success, maybe not a little bit of politics, and plenty of tenacity. And while we would have liked to see an Olympic medal out of his tenure, we did see unprecedented success on the World Series circuit. Under Friday, the USA became a world power in 7s; there's no denying that fact. While previous coaches might have put together a launching pad for the 2014-2024 USA team, Friday did indeed take advantage.
He figured out how to use and exploit the supreme talent of Carlin Isles, something previous coaches had struggled with. Isles retired from the team having led the World Series in tries twice and having scored 217 times, which is 8th all-time. He figured out how to use the talent of Perry Baker, and helped make Speed Stick into a two-time World Rugby Player of the Year. Baker is second all-time in World Series tries scored.
The team itself reached heights never before seen. They won tournaments, finished on the podium multiple times, and from the 2014-15 season through the 2021-22 season they finished lower than 6th only once, and finished as high as 2nd, which was 2018-19.
If the 2020 Olympics had actually been played in 2020, it's very possible the USA would have secured a medal; but the COVID delay was very bad timing for the Eagles and they finished 6th.
This past year, however, exposed something that is true about almost every sports coach—if you don't have the players, what then? The players on the team 2022-2024 have been good, sometimes excellent, but they were missing one or two world-class performers, and missing the consistency of lineup Friday enjoyed in the preceding years. How did he handle it? In the end the success wasn't quite there and his attempts to get the band back together for one last concert didn't quite take.
They finished 8th in Paris, and before that took 9th in the World Series, forcing the Eagles to play in the re-qualification tournament in order to regain a spot in the World Series. That wasn't what anyone wanted. They did requalify, but it should never have been a question.
But all that makes it easy to forget that the USA team became a world power under Friday.
So now what? Well one of Friday's goals was to nurture some coaches in the USA. He did that, usually getting older 7s team players into coaching roles and also working with other coaches as well. Meanwhile, the emergence of PR7s has given elite-level coaching opportunities for some others. It seems pretty clear that we need a USA-based coach.
This is an American team with a capital A. Because rugby is an Olympic sport, the USOPC requires and expects the players on the team are US citizens. It's no coincidence that the USA's improved success coincided with that requirement. Why wouldn't the USA team also benefit from an American citizen as their head coach?
Certainly, and we've hit this drum a few times, a coach who knows the US landscape, who knows the obstacles players have to overcome, knows who the young players are and how they progress to the USA team, is preferable to someone who has to learn this all over.
In addition, the game is changing. International Rugby 7s is played differently now than it was 20 years ago, or event 10 years ago, It helps to have someone who played in the more modern era, and it helps to gave someone who understands the younger players.
Candidates? We've got two. It seems like former USA star Zack Test is being groomed for a major coaching job in the system and that's a good thing. He served as the assistant for the USA Women's team that just won Bronze in Paris. Is he ready to be a Head Coach? That's up to people who are making the decisions, but he's definitely a candidate.
The other is David Fee. Another former USA star, just slightly before Test's time. Fee has coached at the elite club and college level and also with the USA U18s. He, perhaps more than anyone, knows the players who around. And he's served as a Head Coach.
There may be others, but these two show the profile of who is out there—and it's worth noting we've observed both coaches coach and they are quite different in their styles, so someone will have to decide which style works best. What if they work as a team, with the older Fee in charge as Test takes a few years to full round out his skills? Just an idea.
But, there is no reason we should look overseas for a coach when we have smart rugby people who have been involved in a successful program here. What we need is a USA-based coach who is there all the time overseeing and developing what we expect will be a young team that has to drive the rebuilding of a team that will see, we expect, a number of retirements.
