1975 Sexist OSU Newsletter
The Old Man, the newsletter of the Ohio State University Men’s Rugby club announced the formation of the Ohio State women’s team. Note the graphic illustration of a female player.
1977 The Pitch
The Tube and the Pitch, two different Ohio State Women’s team newsletters from 1977 show the grassroots organizing, bawdy nature of women’s rugby at the time.
Support us today!
When you contribute to the U.S. Women’s Rugby Foundation you become part of a movement to support girls and women involved in rugby.
We are a 501(c) (3) non-profit organization.
All donations made are tax deductible.
Support us today!
When you contribute to the U.S. Women’s Rugby Foundation you become part of a movement to support girls and women involved in rugby.
We are a 501(c) (3) non-profit organization.
All donations made are tax deductible.
In 1990 Anne Barry began her storied administrative career when she became the treasurer of USA Rugby, a position she held for over 8 years. In 1992 she became a board member of USA Rugby, a position she held until 2005. In 1998 she became the first woman President of USAR.
Anne Barry was the first woman to serve as President and Treasurer of USAR. When she took over as the Treasurer, USAR had little infrastructure and was nearly $4 million in debt. Barry strengthened the organization, increased funding, and built large financial reserves that became the funding source for future international events in the US. As President of USAR she helped lead a remarkable growth in US rugby, including the acceptance of the sport by the U.S. Olympic Committee, the start of a national youth rugby development program, and the creation of the North American West Indies Rugby Association (NAWIRA). She increased funding to the USA Women's National Teams, and created the Club and Individual Participation Program (CIPP). Anne is widely regarded as the most effective leader EVER of USA rugby. (Wendy Young).
In 1990 the U.S. The Women's National Team, competing under the name USA Presidents 15, traveled to New Zealand to compete in the Women’s World Rugby Festival. The Presidents 15 posted a record of 3-1 with their only loss coming at the hands of New Zealand.
We received a formal invitation to the World Cup, which had to be responded to by USARFU (now USAR). Looking back, I’m sure it was a moment for USARFU because the invitation came from the WRFU, not the RFU. Because the women were still running our own show, under the umbrella of USARFU, it would have been difficult to stop us from going. I don’t recall anyone actually trying to do that. At the time, I had a rather good relationship with the staff of USARFU and with some members of the Executive Committee, and they understood our determination. We did enough to stay within the boundaries of the USARFU but still control our own game. In the end, the World Cup cost about $38,000, not including airfare for the players. Most of the trip was paid for by the players themselves. (Jami Jordan)
The 1991 U.S. Women's National team was a talented and experienced group that included six future Hall of Fame players including Kathy Flores, Patty Jervey, Jen Crawford, Candi Orsini, Tam Breckenridge, and MA Sorenson. (The entire 1991 team was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2016).
The team also included experienced players like Krista McFarren, Annie Flavin, Barb Fugate, Christine Harju, and Tara Flanigan who, with Tam Breckenridge, formed the infamous ‘Locks from Hell.’ The team captains were Mary Sullivan and Barb Bond. Barb was a surprising choice, a young #8 from California. Barb had a reputation as a dominant, steady player but did not have the star power of many of the others. As she recalls, I had no idea why I was chosen to be the captain and it was very difficult to lead a team of virtual strangers. Her quiet, consistent leadership proved to be a good choice for a team of stars.
The tournament featured an interesting array of national teams, most of whom stayed in cold, cramped dorms. The weather was brutal - freezing rain and muddy fields. In their first rain-soaked match the U.S. barely squeaked by the Netherlands. Most of the players recalled fearing hypothermia during the game.
Co-Captain, Mary Sulllivan recalls: After the match, we raced into the locker room to find a line of showerheads that trickled out a small stream of lukewarm water. Each shower head had 2 or 3 players huddled under it trying to share the small dribble of water. We slowly peeled off our jerseys, jog bras, shorts and underwear with our shaking fingers. Many of us were so cold and cramped we could not untie our shoes, so our amazing managers crawled through the shower and untied our muddy laces and helped us take off our mud-caked cleats. (Read a more extended recollection by Sully here: Mary Sullivan Recollection
The U.S. eventually won their pool, setting up a final against a talented English side that was playing in front of a home crowd. The U.S. women put together their finest match and beat England to win the first Women’s World Cup. As the sweaty players hugged and champagne corks popped, members of the Women’s Committee quietly breathed a sigh of relief. They alone, with no resources and no support from USARFU, had brought the team together from four territories, gotten the team to Wales, and now watched as the players lifted the cup.
Read Barb Fugate 1991 World Cup Heartbreak (Barb is in the center, blue sweatsuit, above)
1991 World Cup Part 1
1991 World Cup USA vs England
1991 World Cup Part 2
1991 World Cup Part 3
There was no fanfare when the players returned to the U.S. and few U.S. newspapers carried the story. Most of the players were back at work within a day of returning. In celebration of Girls and Women in Sports Day, the team received an invitation to the White House and were greeted by First Lady Barbara Bush, who posed throwing the rugby ball like a football.
Another notable first at the 1991 World Cup was U.S. referee Laurel Lockett serving as Head Referee for the England v Italy match. Laurel, the highest ranked woman in the U.S. was the first U.S. female to referee an international match. Laurel also was a Head Referee during the 1993 Canada Cup.
1990 Trading Cards
While the players and coaches were basking in their success, the Women’s Committee was back at work fighting for resources. The success of the women’s national team pressed the question of why USARFU refused to support the women’s national team.
Leading this discreet inquiry was Jami Jordan, the Chair of the Women’s Committee (1989-1993). We were running women’s rugby on a volunteer basis. We didn’t tend to have strong relationships with one another outside of the Committee and only met to do business. Most of our challenges were dealing with the men and the ‘lowly position’ of women’s rugby in the USARFU pecking order. But we were a defiant group, committed to growing the women’s game.
Given all that we accomplished between 1979 and 1994 as a young, volunteer organization, it’s pretty amazing that the women running things didn’t blow up. But we weren’t perfect. We fell victim to regional politics, particularly around the hiring and firing of USWNT coaches. By and large, the Women’s Committee operated on a consensus basis, but we did vote on things. My memory is that we agreed on many things and that we were usually in alignment or at least mostly in alignment. But the selection of national team coaches was the most contentious. Much of that can be attributed to intense regional loyalties to certain coaches that were off putting to other regions.
USARFU folded the Women’s Committee into its existing list of committees and allocated a $1250 annual operating budget.
Almost in defiance of the IRB ruling, a women’s international conference was held again in 1998 in the Netherlands where women from different rugby nations met to contest the idea of ‘full integration’ into existing governing boards. The consensus was that there were gross disparities across countries for how national governing boards treated women’s rugby. But, as if to make it painfully clear that there would be no routes for women to bring their grievances to the IRB, the IRB incongruously appointed a man to be the chair of the women’s liaison committee, dismissing the experience, expertise and ability of women who had been moving mountains.
Some of the Women’s Committee members stayed active and worked on USARFU committees on behalf of women’s rugby, but decision-making about women’s rugby fell to committees populated mostly by men. Some men were longtime allies of women’s rugby and did much to support women’s rugby, others were ambivalent or obstructionist. The loss of women’s autonomy, leadership and ingenuity not just in the U.S. but across the globe was heartbreaking.
If you could take one lesson from their stories, it was they had confidence in themselves. They knew no system or organization was going to move women’s rugby forward. The task of growing the game was on their shoulders, with few resources they successfully created the Women’s National Team, the World Cup, Interterritorial Championships, Select Sides, Club Nationals, and Collegiate Nationals.
The U.S. women showed up to the finals of the 1994 Women’s World Cup having shattered the international scoring record. Over four preliminary matches they had outscored their opponent by a combined score of 364-15. The local press described their play as ‘pyrotechnics’ for their explosive ability to score.
It was an extraordinarily talented U.S. team. The backline had four future Hall of Fame players including fullback Jen Crawford, who at the time was celebrated as the greatest back in the women’s game. Jen was joined by future Hall of Fame players Candi Orsini, Krista McFarren, and Patty Jervey (who was the most capped player on the U.S. team). The forwards were also a celebrated and experienced bunch. The most decorated U.S. prop at the time and 1991 World Cup alumna Annie Flavin, was at loosehead and
MA Sorensen was the steady, powerful anchor at tighthead. 1991 World Cup alumnae Tara Flanagan, Jan Rutkowski, Kathy Flores, Mary Dixey, Patty Connell, Cassie Law and Captain, Barb Bond provided international experience and power. It was a large and impressive roster, and the players did not disappoint over the first four games. But in the finals, they met their match on a rainy field, as the England forwards stole the day and won the match 38-23.
By the fall of 1993, the 1994 Women’s World Cup was hanging by a thread. That it did finally come together was a miracle cooked up by a tenacious group of Scottish women.
The Netherlands was slated to host the ’94 Cup but months prior to the tournament they ran into trouble. While women’s rugby in the Netherlands was integrated into the larger Dutch Rugby Union,
WRWC 1994 FINAL BBC RUGBY SPECIAL RUSHES
the organizers decided to form a separate foundation for hosting the World Cup, the Foundation for the Women’s Rugby World Cup 1994. While in communication with their male counterparts, The Foundation did not create formal ties with the Dutch Rugby Union or the International Rugby Board (iRB) now, World Rugby. In October of 1993 several iRB member countries announced they would not allow their women’s teams to participate in the World Cup as the event did not have formal ties with the iRB. The Dutch Rugby Union and the Foundation was forced to announce that they were postponing the tournament until 1996. This was a cancellation, not a postponement. The Dutch women’s team really had no say in the matter, the iRB was miffed and made it clear that if the Dutch went ahead with the tournament, the iRB would suspend the Dutch membership. The Dutch Rugby Union threatened the tournament organizers that if the Foundation went ahead with the tournament, they would cancel the entire women’s national program. The Dutch Union notified the US Women’s Committee December 29, 1993, of their decision to cancel the 1994 Women’s World Cup. That’s when Scotland women - fully supported by the Scottish Rugby Union and the Women’s Rugby Football Union stepped into the breach.
1996 Interview with Hall of Fame player, Jenn Crawford
The tournament was scheduled for April 10-24, giving Scotland three months and ten days to organize the entire tournament. The lack of iRB approval meant that several women’s teams would be unable to participate including New Zealand, Germany, and Italy. As iRB continued to withhold approval the organizing committee began hedging their bets calling the tournament the ‘World Championship ‘and the ‘World Cup.’ Given that some top teams were not going to be playing, some unions, including the U.S. raised concerns about calling it a World Cup. The distinction between a World Championship or a World Cup was significant as it affected the legitimacy of the tournament. Ultimately the organizing committee took a leap, dropping ‘World Championship’ from their materials and moved ahead with the title, ‘World Cup.’ The organizers held their breath, but the iRB did not push back. For a complete story of the 1994 World Cup please read The 1994 U.S. Women’s World Cup Team.
The real story of England’s heroic 1994 World Cup winning team | House of Rugby IWD Special
1998, the First Women's World Cup to be sanctioned by the iRB. The 1998 World Cup was the first World Cup to have the IRB’s blessing. The U.S. would again make the finals, losing 44-12 to a dominant New Zealand team. The U.S. team's third straight medal.
The tournament took place in Amsterdam, in the Netherlands, the first women's world cup held outside of the United Kingdom.The tournament saw a record sixteen teams compete and experienced heightened media attention. There was no qualification process, teams taking part were invited by the iRB.
In 1996 the first assembly of a National Women’s 7s team was formed. Atlantis coach and 7s pioneer, Emil Signes held tryouts to pick a team to compete in the first Women’s International 7s tournament to be held during the Hong Kong 7s event. The team competed under the name Atlantis, and finished their tour undefeated. Many of the players went on to compete for the USA Women’s 7s Team in the Hong Kong 7s Women’s Division.
In August of 1996, Head Coach Emil Signes organized the first U.S. National Women's Sevens Camp.
In 1997 the first U.S. Women's National 7s Team was formed. The team competed in the Hong Kong 7s tournament against other national sides. The tournament was played over two days, and required 7 games to win (2 pools of 6 plus semifinals and finals). The U.S. beat England in the semi final 17-5 to advance to the finals against New Zealand Wild Ducks (NZ rugby union was unwilling to sanction the NZ women as a national team). New Zealand beat the U.S. 43-0 to win the tournament.
In 1997, the first U23 Women’s National Team was formed. Penn State Coach Peter Steinberg was appointed Head Coach. The U23s faced Canada in the first ever, U23 international match at the 1997 Can Am series. In a moving moment the first U.S. Women’s National Team celebrated their 10-year anniversary by cheering on the Women’s U23 National Team.
First U23 Roster
U.S. v Canada
1998 U23 player Hedwig Aerts
The U.S. team returned to Hong Kong 7s for the ‘unofficial’ world championship for women. The U.S. beat England 24-5 in the semi-finals and lost to New Zealand 29-0 (Below).
The 1998 National 7s Team at the Magnificent 7s Tournament in Toronto
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, women’s rugby continued to grow with a majority of those teams some hybrid of college students and community members. Until 1992, very few rosters of women’s collegiate rugby teams were entirely undergraduate students of the university; most college teams were made up of graduate students, alumni, and local residents.
It’s not surprising that women’s rugby initially flourished in college towns. In the 1970s, college towns were attractive places to live - rent was cheap, the music was good, co-ops abounded, few graduates were burdened with student debt, and the pressure to enter the job market wasn’t as prevalent. Many college towns like Madison, WI, Tallahassee, FL, and Chapel Hill, NC, also had strong feminist communities with notable artists and writers living in the area. Another perk was that university fields were generally easy to access.
Over the years many players moved out of college towns and seeded new teams around the country. Many women’s teams can trace their roots back to a handful of college teams (University of Wisconsin, University of Illinois, Texas A&M, Louisiana State University, Florida State University, UC San Diego, University of Virginia, to name a few). By the mid to late 1980s, more college teams began to attract traditional age college players which often resulted in mismatches between college teams with rosters of young, novice players and college teams that were essentially club teams with rosters dominated by experienced, older players. Florida State University was a notable example of a university team that dominated the college and club levels - they won a number of national championships in the late 1970s and into the 1980s with only a handful of undergraduate students on the roster.
The Women’s Committee, the governing body of women’s rugby, understood the challenges and dangers of hosting events in which club and college teams competed against one another. A few forward-looking administrators aligned themselves with precocious college students who were invested in developing the collegiate game for undergraduate students including developing a true collegiate championship.
Two of those precocious students were Roshna Wunderlich and Colleen Lanigan, both students at the University of Virginia in the 1980s. Roshna and Colleen were young but many women administrators at that time were also young with very few over the age of 30. Together these young women ‘built the road as they walked it,’ creating a pathway for the future of women’s rugby.
The inaugural National Collegiate Championship was held in 1991 and hosted by Northern Virginia Women (NOVA). Chris Casatelli was the president of NOVA and did much to organize the tournament. But even at the first championship teams were not yet fully ‘collegiate.’ The guidelines for the 1991 Collegiate Championships were that 85% of the team members had to be enrolled as undergraduate students. The Air Force Academy, a roster of 100% undergraduate students, defeated Boston College for the first National Collegiate Championship.
The 1992 National Collegiate Championship required that 100% of the rostered players be enrolled undergraduate students. This 1992 National Championship was hosted by the Air Force Academy and came on the heels of a long debate about who should govern women’s collegiate rugby (as well as the format of the national championships). It was an interesting debate because, in the long term, it seemed clear that men's and women's collegiate teams should be governed together but there was a real disparity in access to resources and overall interest in the women’s game from collegiate men or USA Rugby. The people who really cared about women's collegiate rugby were the women’s clubs because they knew their vitality and future depended on the women’s collegiate game. The women who had just won the World Cup were also heroes to many collegiate players - they represented a possibility that never had existed for women. Nevertheless, it was clear that the issues facing collegiate women were more aligned with the issues facing collegiate men and so it was decided to identify with college rugby as opposed to women’s rugby (Roshan Wunderlich)
In the 1980s UVA hosted the Virginia Women’s Invitational Tournament. As we fostered the growth of collegiate programs across the Virginia Rugby Union (VRU), which was also happening in neighboring states, we faced the dilemma every year of creating fair brackets of play with strong club teams and fledgling inexperienced collegiate teams. We were the first tournament to create a separate division for true collegiate teams, and also premiere several budding high school programs from the Northern Virginia area in exhibition matches. It was exciting to see so many women of all ages and skill sets coming together in one venue. There was a feeling and vibrant energy that our sport was about to have a growth spurt, with older and younger players working together to create a unified future. We were ready to create the collegiate championships. (Colleen Lanigan)
One of the biggest challenges we faced was timely communication. No one had computers - email didn’t exist so we communicated by LETTERS. I am amazed that we organized national championships by mail and through landline telephone conversations. The communication challenges really showed and at the first collegiate championship some things went disastrously wrong. Overall miscommunications often led to unnecessary conflicts. (Roshna Wunderlich)
Since the Women’s Committee was still essentially running women’s events under the auspices of USAR, we felt we could not hold a separate collegiate event. Human resources were just too scarce. We decided to hold the event alongside the Women’s Club Nationals in Washington D.C. over Memorial Day weekend. From a collegiate schedule standpoint, this made no sense. College students were out of school and had been for weeks at that point. But teams came anyway. Several men on the Collegiate Committee were in an uproar that we were going ahead with the event. They publicly called the women organizers ‘irresponsible’. Did I mention that the women’s college teams came anyway? We only allowed 25 minute halves during the first collegiate championships. The feedback from the teams afterwards was that they didn’t want 25 minute halves, they wanted regulation time. Roshna is also correct in her recount of the struggle between the Women’s Committee and the Collegiate Committee. At some point though, both committees recommended that the administration of women’s collegiate rugby come under the Women’s Committee. However, the USA Rugby Board did not agree and moved it to the Collegiate Committee anyway. (Jami Jordan)
Collegiate Champions
1991 Air Force Academy v Boston College
1992 Boston College v UCONN
1993 UCONN v Air Force Academy
1994 Air Force Academy v Boston College
1995 Princeton University v Penn State
1996 Princeton University v Penn State
1997 Penn State v Radcliffe College
1998 Radcliffe College v Penn State
1999 Stanford University v Princeton University
Gina Raimondo, Governor of Rhode Island and Secretary of Commerce under President Obama was the scrumhalf for Radcliffe Rugby 1990-1993. Radcliffe Rugby became Harvard Rugby Club in 1999.
Shalanda Baker, 1997 MVP Back
Jamie Burke, UVA
A young Pete Steinberg with the 1997 Penn State Team
HIgh School and youth teams continued to be rare. However, Karl Barth was beginning his construction of the Summit High School program and the Midwest and California were beginning to embrace girls youth and high school rugby.
1990 Belmont Shore v Bay Area SheHawks (BASH)
1991 Beantown v Florida State University
1992 BASH v Berkeley All Blues
1993 BASH v Beantown
1994 Berkeley All Blues v BASH
1995 BASH v Berkeley All Blues
1996 Beantown v Berkeley All Blues
1997 Berkeley All Blues v Maryland Stingers
1998 Berkeley All Blues v Maryland Stingers
1999 Berkeley All Blues v Beantown
From the early 1980s until the mid-1990s the route to the Women’s National Team was through the Territorial Championships. Club players competed to represent local ‘territorial teams’ (New England, Eastern Pennsylvania, SoCal, South, etc); from those teams players would be chosen for one of four, larger territorial teams (East, West, Pacific and Midwest). The annual playoffs of the four territories was an opportunity to see the best players in the country going head-to-head. The advantage of territorial play at the time was it allowed players and coaches to develop against good competition and be seen by national selectors.
The members of the Women’s Committee were rarely recognized or thanked for the work they did for over twenty-five years but their contributions to women’s rugby are undeniable. On the slimmest of margins and with constant opposition, they laid the foundation and built women's rugby at every level. The rugby we enjoy today is a direct result of their work.
We were running women’s rugby on a volunteer basis. We didn’t tend to have strong relationships with one another outside of the Committee and only met to do business. Most of our challenges were dealing with the men and the ‘lowly position’ of women’s rugby in the USARFU pecking order. But we were a defiant group, committed to growing the women’s game.
Given all that we accomplished between 1979 and 1994 as a young, volunteer organization, it’s pretty amazing that the women running things didn’t blow up. But we weren’t perfect. We fell victim to regional politics, particularly around the hiring and firing of USWNT coaches. By and large, the Women’s Committee operated on a consensus basis, but we did vote on things. My memory is that we agreed on many things and that we were usually in alignment or at least mostly in alignment. But the selection of national team coaches was the most contentious. Much of that can be attributed to intense regional loyalties to certain coaches that were off putting to other regions. (Jami Jordan)
