Difference between revisions of "Story of how our teams got started"

Revision as of 21:28, 2 January 2019

Rugby was an intramural sport since the onset of the Academy. Our extramural history starts from 1961, as the Academy had occasion to pull from intramural rugby players to compete against visiting overseas teams. Officially founded as a club team in 1968 by Captain Alan Osur and C2C Angus MacDonald, our first matches were on 29 September 1968 where the A team ("All Blues") beat the Denver Highlanders, 29-0, and the B side ("Silver side") played the Denver University A team to a 16-16 tie. Fit and fast described play in those early years, prompting the Eastern Rockies Rugby Union President, Terry Fleener [1], to nickname us "Zoomies"... the nickname replaced "All Blues", which had lasted until the end of 1969, and continues on to this day.

Coach Osur rotated away from the Academy, but upon his return he completed the full presence of rugby at the Academy by forming and coaching the AFA women's team. The teams operated as one club until 1980 when they split into Men's and Women's. Alan's pupils have gone on to play (some at the highest levels), start many a rugby club, and coach thousands of other players at all age groups. Alan's contribution to our sport and our Academy is another story, but this website is seeded in his initiatives.... His contributions were memorialized in a video put together by a few of his women players and is worthy for all to watch to gain insight on the man who was the founder of our sport at the Academy: [[1]]