Rugby Tries and Knock Ons: Tales of a college rugby player in New England and the game that gave birth to American football - Paperback

by Connor Murphy (Author)

We had just beaten a few of the top men's rugby football clubs in the East that excelled in both sevens and fifteens...

This included Mystic River, Beacon Hill, the Washington Exiles, and two good college teams - Brown University and Coast Guard Academy. As I prepared for the championship final against another very good men's club - the Hartford Wanderers RFC - I lay down on the sidelines and stretched my sore leg muscles. My mind drifted and I couldn't help but remember the previous three consecutive finals our school (University of Rhode Island) had participated in. We had beaten some excellent teams each year to advance to the Harvard Business School Sevens finals, but we had lost each close championship match. This rugby sevens tournament was the most popular sevens tournament in the East, and it consisted of rugby clubs - men's and college teams from all over and the U.S. - winner takes all!

This Sevens Rugby tournament in Boston, Mass., that we competed in during the 70s and 80s finally ended its run after many years of highly competitive rugby and does not exist today. This was also due to the growth of Rugby Sevens popularity in the U.S. and worldwide, including the Olympics, so teams couldn't enter every tournament due to the cost of entry, hotels if necessary, and travel.

This sports team memoir is about a fun, underdog, college rugby club without a coach, and their adventures on and off the pitch. They discovered this great game in the 1970s at the University of Rhode Island, and nobody was ever cut from the three total teams (only one varsity team) that participated in both spring and fall seasons in each college year.