When the Cal rugby team was invited to participate in the USA Rugby College 7s Championships, head coach Jack Clark was primarily concerned with whether the tournament overlapped with the players’ academic calendars.
Now that classes end this week, Clark gave his team the green light to travel to College Station, Tex. on Wednesday for the 24-team, premier fall tournament starting on Friday.
“We wouldn’t consider the tournament if there were academic conflicts,” Clark said in a Nov. 8 interview with Cal Athletics.
Clark made his priorities clear: academics first, athletics second. But when he and his team first step on the field on Friday morning, winning the tournament will be the only thing in mind.
The Bears will play all three Pool B teams on Friday, first against Middlebury at 9 a.m., North Carolina State at 1 p.m. and Arkansas State at 5. The winners of the six pools and the two best-runner ups will advance to the quarterfinals.
Of the three tilts, the evening game against Arkansas State will be the toughest for Cal. The Red Wolves reached the semifinals of last year’s College 7s Championships. But considering the tournament composes 24 elite rugby programs in America, the talent margins are nearly negligible.
“The pools are all pretty even,” Clark said.
The 7s game in general is fairly new territory for the Bears. After decades of playing the traditional 15s game, Cal is in the midst of a multi-year project to move toward the newly rising 7s game.
The main difference between the 15s and 7s is the number of starting players and the playing time. Despite the same field dimensions, the 7s game field less than half the players of the 15s and only sport seven-minute halves.
It results in a fast-paced, high-scoring game in which one mistake can irreparably impact the short-lived game. The 7s game is becoming popular over the slower, grittier 15s game.
“One tough call can break a game,” Clark said. “These games are dangerous.”
But for the Bears, the road to the trophy won’t be a smoothly paved road. As Cal slowly adjusts its focus and team dynamics to the fast-paced 7s game, the Bears are struggling with a bevy of injuries. Clark did not believe the 7s game were the reason for the injuries.
Most of the injuries were inflicted onto the starting upperclassmen, forcing the inexperienced underclassmen to play. But there are a few veterans, most notably senior Seamus Kelly, who will be the lynchpin of Cal’s seven-player starting rotation. In his 30 appearances playing the 7s, Kelly tallied 28 tries.
But this squad is not yet at the championship caliber Clark demands every year.
Yet Clark doesn’t believe this will be the tournament to turn the page. In this frenzy of a rugby game, consistency is thrown out the window.
“I don’t think we’ve ever been great, but we’ve been good,” Clark said. “I don’t think consistency will do any good in this tournament.”
Contact Seung Y. Lee at [email protected]
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