The USA HS All Americans’ 2-1 day at the World School 7s was a surprise.

Regardless of how the tournament ends, it has to be considered something of a success given expectations.

And those expectations were that this was something of a fact-finding mission. Players needed to see what the standard was, and needed to take their lumps. But the USA team has been really strong, losing to the defending champion NZ Condors 19-7, and beating Rugby Academy Fiji 12-7 and Indigenous Australia 31-0.

Head Coach JD Stephenson said this was a long-term project regardless. He plans to bring the HSAA men’s 7s team to the World School 7s next year, along with a women’s team as well.

“I am really proud of the boys and how they approached this,” said Stephenson. “We made some good adjustments after the first game, especially to the refereeing. Here if a defender just gets his hands on the ball [in the breakdown] the referee is penalizing holding on. So we had to be a bit flatter and look for contact to make sure we retained ball, and they responded well.”

Better ball placement also helped, But Stephenson added that he told the players they should play like they are the best-prepared team there. Most of the teams at the World School 7s have not been together for long, and the HSAA team had some time together, as well as support from HSAA 15s Head Coach Brendan Keane, and USA National Team staff from the training center at Chula Vista. 

“We knew there would be teams with one or two really strong players they would rely on, so we took the approach that seven beats one and work together as a team,” Stephenson said. “We came here because we wanted to make an impact.”

As the North American Lions learned in Dubai, you can start strong and slip up one time and it’s over (the Lions went 3-0 in pool play and then lost in the quarterfinals to a team they had already beaten). 

The HSAA boys will have a difficult road in the knockout rounds, but they have already shown they can play rugby. If they keep that team approach, they might surprise some people again.