As people across the world tuned into the 2024 Paris Summer Olympics, many found themselves watching rugby, a sport that has continued to grow and expand.
For the first time, the United States women’s national rugby sevens team medaled at the 2024 Olympics, earning the bronze medal over Australia, 14-12.
It wasn’t just the on field success from the national team that has led to an increase in interest in the sport, but the exciting personalities from many of the players, including Ilona Maher and Naya Tapper.
To some girls at the University of South Carolina, rugby is not only something they are familiar with, but something they have used to find meaningful bonds both on and off the field.
While the national team gained viewership and it’s star players gained more notoriety, the club team at South Carolina also felt the impact of the 2024 Summer Olympics
Growth of the club
The club does a large amount of recruiting during the school’s annual organization fair, where the team's members will set up a table and pitch their club to interested students.
However earlier this semester, Parks Elkins, club president and third-year aerospace engineering student, noticed that more students were showing up and committing to the team, something she attributes to the Olympics.
“In the past we’ve had a lot of people come up to the table but that doesn’t translate to new people in practice,” Elkins said. “But this year, most everyone that came to the table came to practice at least once, tried it out. But even after first and second practice we still had a lot of retention, and I do think it has a lot to do with that.”
The women’s club rugby team takes a different approach when it comes to acquiring new members.
Unlike other teams that have a tryout, the club emphasizes that it is a non committal club, meaning a player can go to a couple of practices to get a feel and make a decision if they want to keep practicing, backs captain and second-year sport and entertainment management student Lilly Zellner said.
Zellner said this approach to the organization boasts a large number of members with around 50 girls, half of them being new.
In order to keep growing the club, the organization is trying to put together a clinic for local high schools in order to try and teach the game of rugby to a younger audience.
“We want to teach younger girls about it so that when they do get to a point where rugby is available for them, or if they want to start their own club, they're able to do it,” Elkins said.
Creating friendship and meaningful bonds
Even with such a large team, there is concentrated effort on making sure all of the organization's members are included and welcomed.
One of the team's new members is third-year journalism student Megan Ivey. Even though this is their first year on South Carolina’s club team, Ivey had previous experience from another club team.
But even though Ivey is new to the club, they are like a part of the family. The club accomplishes this through several ways, such as group lifting sessions, according to Ivey.
“I think that also plays a really big part of the community too," Ivey said. "Being like, 'Oh my teammates are going to workout, lets go work out together so that forms that bond, that connection,' and I think that definitely also transfers onto the field as well.”
Even after games, the club makes an extensive effort to highlight players that had strong performances in each of their matches, boosting morale across the team.
Following a game, the executive board of the club decides on a back and forward of the match, the two main position groups of rugby. After the club’s game against Lander University, Ivey was honored with the forward of the match title.
Another reason for the team developing such a tight knit connection with one another is the lack of competing for spots on the team, thus making practice an opportunity for girls to learn the game.
“I think it helps that we're not fighting for spots on a roster, we don’t do tryouts. So we’re not competitive with one another, we’re really trying to help each other grow,” Zellner said. “And you see that a lot at practices, you’ll have people who have played for a couple years helping the people who are brand new.”
Outside of playing or training for rugby, the team hosts dinners and different community service events to form tighter bonds Zellner said.
One of these community service efforts took place on Saturday Sept. 28, when the team picked up trash on the side of the road as a part of the Keep The Midlands Beautiful project.
Moving forward
Following last season, the organization has begun the process of trying to move into a more competitive club, compared to mainly a social one.
The team will be participating in the South Atlantic Rugby Conference, and will have two conference games on their schedule, with one of the two having already been played.
On Sept. 21, the team faced off against the University of North Carolina Greensboro, however, South Carolina was granted the win before the match even started because UNCG did not have enough members to play.
The two teams did play in a friendly match with some members of the Gamecock squad joining UNCG, which provided the younger players with valuable experience, Zellner said.
“Our rookies, who probably wouldn't have had a chance to play at all, were able to get some really good playing time, and I was able to see on their face, they were happy to be on the field and happy to be a part of something,” Zellner said.
The club has one more conference game at the University of North Carolina Charlotte, as well as two more friendlies, games not counting toward the teams conferecne record, against The Citadel and the University of Florida.