While cutting football from the athletic program in 1997, Boston University President emeritus John Silber told The Daily Free Press that the Universities of Paris, Oxford and Cambridge “have gotten along remarkably well and never had football.” In the present day, Juan Pablo Benitez’s bruised knee, broken fingers, stitched forehead, lacerated eyebrow and nearly broken neck will certainly agree with Silber.
After all, BU still has rugby.
“People think we’re just a bunch of guys that get together and play, then go drink afterwards,” Benitez, a junior, said. “But this sport is a deep commitment. You can’t be a slouch and come play rugby every Saturday.”
BU’s club rugby team finished its 2005 fall slate at 4-3 in its Division II regular season before suffering a loss to the University of Rhode Island, 22-10, in the first round of the Northeast Rugby Federation Union (NERFU) playoffs. The Terriers made the final eight by shutting out St. Michael’s, 10-0.
After finishing in last place in Division I last season, the 55-player BU squad moved down to Division II for 2005 and will play teams such as Williams College, Middlebury College, Babson College, Bryant University and St. Michael’s College until they win the division to move back up.
“This season was a big step for the program,” said BU coach Justin Evans. “I can say I was satisfied with our progress, especially for a club team. To turn around and beat the other legitimate teams in our division is nothing to be ashamed of. I feel within three years, we can win with this group.”
As deep as some of the cuts run, the tradition runs deeper. The team celebrated its 30th anniversary this past December, reliving decades of taped fingers, sprained limbs and scrums by defeating the alumni, 40-12. More than 100 Terriers – both aging nostalgics and current bruisers – showed that they still care about the sport and breed that same dedication to the current team.
Evans, a former professional for Italy’s Bologna and Piacenza until coming stateside in 2001, roamed the sidelines as an assistant for Harvard University. The London native came to a disorganized Terrier program looking for a new path after disagreeing with the head coach’s methods.
“I didn’t like the way he was teaching the kids,” he said. “His methods were too traditional, and I just didn’t think his strategy was working. I had coached junior teams in Italy, so I figured I could get a chance to do it myself.”
The game of rugby was born in 1823, when a soccer player picked up the ball and ran with it, and the new hybrid sport was immediately instituted at Oxford University.
Rugby’s reputation as a brutal, Neanderthal sport was bred upon its arrival in the United States decades later.
Terrier team captain Jon Brosnahan has played rugby since high school, where his Xaverian High School (Manhattan) finished third in the nation. He jumped at the opportunity to play at BU and show students that rugby has more intelligence than the stereotype would insist.
“A lot of people watching on TV would be like, ‘Oh, it’s so barbaric,'” he said. “Once you start watching it, you realize there’s a lot of skill involved. There’s constant movement, so that just makes the game more intense. The physicality is there, but it’s a lot more difficult mentally than people give it credit for. You have to be thinking two and three moves ahead out there.”
But sometimes it all happens too fast. Too quickly. Too violently. Last fall, Benitez fell under a pile during the team’s 40-7 loss to Middlebury. As the players loaded on, the pressure on his neck grew. He had to be removed on a stretcher and neckboard.
He missed only two weeks of action with muscle stretches and minor damage.
“That was something else,” he said. “I just had to make sure when I could play again, doing an inventory. I was thankful I could move so I could play again. I didn’t want to miss much time.”
As a club sport, the team does not qualify for funding from the athletic department, but instead is funded by the allotment for BU’s Physical Education, Recreation and Dance department. The team’s erratic practice schedule includes trips off campus to Moakley Field in South Boston and the Harvard Rugby Fields. BU allowed the team to play its alumni game on Nickerson Field, but that’s the only real gift the team has received.
The team spends its offseason maintaining a training regimen and raising money. A few teammates spend each Saturday morning working for a moving company, and the team has already raised a few thousand dollars for next season. With the club’s future constantly depending on donations and alumni grants, outsiders may find it hard to believe that people would bang up their bodies for the sport here at BU.
Before his rugby experience at BU, Benitez’s experience was Pop Warner football; his high school in Plano, Texas didn’t have a football team. He was approached in his freshman year at the Splash orientation expo to join the team; his 5-foot, 11-inch, 225-pound frame helped him stand out from the crowd.
Benitez soon enrolled as a prop-half, a front player who acts as the kicking and scoring specialist. His first parlay into rugby practice jolted his ego, and he soon realized that this wasn’t an outing.
“I took my first few hits, and I knew this was for real,” he said. “I knew I had to get in shape just to keep up with the rest of these guys. All the new guys go through that. About 100 freshmen come out for sign-ups, then maybe about 30 stay with the team. Those are the ones that want the commitment.”
The import of Evans has bought BU credibility, as the team now has a more centralized leadership. In Brosnahan’s freshman season, the team was more of an intramural social gathering of about 20 players.
“The team was a completely different animal,” he said. “We had to try hard to round guys up for games, and we had to play both the ‘A’ and ‘B’ shifts. It feels like a more legitimate team now.”
“We lost a lot of guys for the first year I was there,” Evans said. “But after our recruiting efforts last fall, we added about 45 boys since last year. We were struggling in Division I. We hadn’t had a winning season for a number of years before I got here. We went to Division II this year, and that felt a lot better for our club.”
The spring season consists mainly of friendly matches to keep the players loose. BU will compete in the annual Beast of the East Tournament in Providence, R.I., and the season culminates with the Rugby Beanpot against – who else but Boston College, Northeastern University and Harvard in the same format as the tournament on ice. Only they get to hit them with less barriers.
“Yeah, that should be fun,” Benitez said. “We get that big-game atmosphere against all the local kids. We get to play programs to get ourselves in that big-team picture.”
Only six Terriers will graduate in May, and Evans said the youth of the team will create another core for the next few seasons; 20 players make up the Class of 2009, with 13 sophomores and 15 juniors rounding out the squad.
Evans said the team hopes to acquire access to a more local field in the next few years and to merely spread the word about the program at BU.
“People just need to come watch a game if they’re interested,” he said. “No matter what your size, a team needs someone. Whether you’re a short, stocky guy or a tall, lanky guy, we probably could use you.”
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