In 1998, I was the Head Coach of Texas A&M Men's Rugby. It was the most fun I had ever experienced! I'd taught the players how to pass and stay in support, corrected bad tackling habits, and was making decent choices at positioning players for matches. However, when I began to TRY to teach decision-making at the breakdown, reading a defense or maintaining a solid defensive stance - well, I was young in the game as a coach and had not learned to teach those skills, yet. I found former US Maccabiah Prop, Alec Klinghoffer and an Assistant Professor from Australia who'd played rugby for years. It quickly became apparent that they were much better prepared for coaching the team than myself. The team worked so hard that I thought they deserved better coaching. Alec soon took the reins as Head Coach.
Fourteen years later, the Australian Professor, Craig Coates, is still involved with the program and has recently become the Director of Rugby for the Texas A&M Men's RFC. We got a chance to talk with Craig about becoming a DoR, selecting a new Head Coach, and where the team is headed and - WOW! - did he deliver some answers!
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| Gladiato Poeta! Faceo Servante! |
RB - Can you briefly summarize the journey from becoming a coach for Texas A&M in 1998 to becoming DoR this past year?
Craig - In 1998 I started coaching at Texas A&M as an assistant coach with primary responsibilities for the backline, under then Head Coach Alec Klinghoffer. Alec finished his Ph.D. a couple of years later and moved out of state for work, at which point I took over as the Head Coach. I was fortunate to be supported by assistant coaches throughout the years including Kathryn Nichol, Johnny Smith, and most recently Jeremy Stewart. In all cases the coaching setup has been a collaborative effort with the coaching titles being on paper more than anything. It was a true pleasure working with and learning from all of these dedicated individuals.
RB - What drove decision for this change?
Craig - Primarily it was the disappointing season that we had last year where we simply did not perform to our potential. Our post-season review identified a number of factors and issues that needed to be improved to get us back on track and many of those were on the coaching side, for which I take full responsibility. In short, as coaches we were spending far too much time on off field tasks associated with recruiting, tournament hosting, fundraising, preparing for our youth rugby summer camp, scheduling, travel planning, dealing with issues associated with collegiate rugby conference realignments, etc; and not nearly enough time actually coaching. We did not prepare the players well enough and the team performance suffered as a result.
RB - Other collegiate programs may be looking to do something similar with their program, what issues should they address? What issues would you regard as your lessons learned in this process?
Craig - A structure must be set up that empowers the coaches to improve the players. That means that their primary focus is on developing practice plans, doing film review, conducting individual player assessments, optimizing the team's game plan and improving player skill levels. That takes a lot of hours and as almost all of us are volunteers with another real job, there is no time left for anything else, which can be very difficult on your personal life.
The problem of course is that all of the other things still need to happen for a club to be truly successful. Recruiting, Fundraising, Game Scheduling, Travel Planning, Community Service, Club Promotion, Alumni Relations, etc, are all critical components of a successful club and it is unrealistic to expect a small group (or one individual student in many cases) of student officers to perform these tasks adequately when they may have no past experience in these areas and have their own responsibilities to prepare and perform as a rugby player, along with the critical need to achieve academic success. That means that many of these tasks are then taken on by the coaching staff which subsequently diminishes their ability to coach the players.
At least the way we have structured things, the primary job of the Director of Rugby is to take on as many of these tasks as possible and thus enable the coaching staff to concentrate solely on the players. In other situations where this is a full-time position the Director of Rugby may also have a primary coaching role. It is important to remember that in the vast majority of situations rugby clubs are under the purview of Student Activities and Recreational Sports, which means by definition that they are to be student-run and are viewed as vehicles for leadership development for the students. The Director of Rugby can act as a mentor for the student club officers, assisting them with decision making, keeping them on task and providing the collective memory and experience from past years; with the students have the ultimate decision making power and responsibility. In our experience, working within the system in this manner has resulted in a satisfactory relationship with Recreational Sports valuing the direction and leadership provided by the Director of Rugby, without removing the responsibilities and decision making from the student officers.
RB - How difficult was it to step out of your coaching shoes after more than a decade?
Craig - It was not difficult at all. The pleasure I get from coaching is watching the players improve over time on and off the field. I am still able to do that in my current position and will hopefully help accelerate that process for the players. While I have taken a step back from coaching as the new staff develop their relationship with the players I am sure I will be able to contribute as time goes on.
I am also continuing to coach with Johnny Smith as a partner in the T5.5 Rugby Development Group which runs individualized training clinics for rugby clubs in Texas as well as performing video and game analysis. We are also planning on expanding to offer a front row/tight 5 academy and a backline decision making academy to further the development of youth rugby in Texas.
RB - The Aggies' search for your replacement was fairly well documented and advertised. How many candidates did you consider for the Head Coach position? What criteria did your search committee determine would be required for a serious candidate?
Craig - The search went very well and I was somewhat surprised by the number of applicants as we had around 15 viable applicants for the Head Coach Position. Unfortunately some of these candidates were foreign nationals who required visa assistance which we are not able to provide, for what is essentially a volunteer position with a small stipend and travel costs covered. Previous Head Coaching experience was highly desirable, as was experience with youth/collegiate rugby players, particularly on the high performance side of the game, along with a strong vision for where they wanted to take Texas A&M Rugby.
RB - What about Brett Mills made him the "the one"?
Craig - Brett fit all of the required and desired attributes that the search committee was looking for. He has extensive coaching experience at local, state, and national levels, primarily with teams and players striving to compete at a national and international level, which was an excellent fit for the desires of our players. Brett has been intricately involved with high performance rugby in Texas so many of the current players were already familiar with his coaching style and his appointment has also attracted some very high quality recruits from within and outside Texas. As an educator Brett understands the dual pressures of being a student athlete and values both pursuits equally. He is a great fit for Texas A&M Rugby and we are grateful that he took on the task.
RB - What are your goals for the program as a whole? Do you plan to integrate a viable 7s program?
Craig - We need to continue improving as a team so we are more consistent in our performances week to week and year to year, and in doing so hope to become serious challengers to the top collegiate rugby programs in the country. We want Texas A&M Rugby to continue to be a viable vehicle for players that aspire to play at the National U20, Collegiate All American level and beyond.
We have always tried to be good ambassadors of the game so we will continue to improve the Gareth Jones Youth Rugby Tournament, expand the Challenger Rugby Event for Kids with Disabilities, build the Texas A&M Summer Rugby Camp experience, and expand our community service activities.
We also need to pursue avenues to reduce the cost of playing rugby for individual players so that this is not an issue that prevents a student from playing the game. In addition to being very active in fundraising, our players take on a large personal financial burden to play for Texas A&M Rugby. Thankfully our alumni organization, Old Maroon Rugby, have taken a very active role in the club and we are able to offer multiple $1,000 Rugby Scholarships that offset the financial burden of playing rugby and importantly, qualify out of state and international students for in state tuition which saves them ~$15,000/yr.
7's Rugby is now an integral part of the collegiate rugby scene in this country. This year we dedicated the majority of our fall season to 7's rugby which also turned out to be a great introduction to the game for those on campus recruits that had not played rugby previously. There is nothing but positives coming from the introduction of 7's rugby into our season. The players are developing their catch/pass skills, refining their contact skills and improving their fitness levels. The top few players at the Collegiate 7's Rugby National Championships were phenomenal athletes.
Craig - We have always wanted to play the best teams in the country on an annual basis. That is the only way you can measure where you are and where you are going as a team and as a player. For many years now we have taken spring break tours to play Cal, St. Mary's, BYU, Utah, San Diego State and UC Santa Barbara. They were great experiences and really tested the players. The main problem was that it was then a year's wait to play those teams again and it is difficult to learn the lesson and improve over that time frame.
The collegiate premier division provided the challenge and the lesson every week. It was a great strain on the players to play a tough team every week but it is the only way forward if they want to improve themselves. While we were disappointed with some of the results, we are not interested in backing down from the challenge and look forward to this years competition. For us we were already traveling to play really good teams, now they are league matches instead of spring break friendlies.
That being said, several years ago Johnny Smith and others worked very hard to form a BigXII rugby conference. We would love to play in our natural setting (although I guess that will soon become the SEC), against our natural rivals, with less travel and be part of something that excites fans and sponsors. However, we could not get all of the teams to buy into the concept and you can't force a team to play in a competition they don't want to be part of.
Craig - We will be hosting the tournament at the new Penberthy Rec Sports Complex which features 2 grass and 2 turf full size fields, all with full size metal posts, lights and scoreboards. In addition there are 4 smaller fields for the lower age group matches so we are once again looking forward to watching teams from U-8's to U-19's compete at a fantastic event. Last year we had 36 teams at the event and with the ability to play a split day/night schedule we will be looking to expand on that number.
We have always invited all of the college coaches in the state to the tournament and hope that more of them take up the opportunity to recruit kids to their programs. We have far too many quality high school rugby players floating around on college campuses that are not playing the game.
RB - The Aggies embark upon a brutal schedule beginning on January 28 at the University of Texas in Austin, TX. After that weekend, A&M will have teams competing in D1A and D2 (in Texas). So there should be plenty of games for them rugby playing boys in Bryan-College Station "to become serious challengers to the top collegiate rugby programs in the country."
Regardless, Texas Aggie Rugby will always live up to that verse from the Last Corps Trip:
I’ve seen them play since way back when,
And they’ve always had the grit;
I’ve seen ‘em lose and I’ve seen ‘em win,
But I’ve never seen ‘em quit.
And they’ve always had the grit;
I’ve seen ‘em lose and I’ve seen ‘em win,
But I’ve never seen ‘em quit.