Rugby 7s- Nate Ebner left the pats for this

scottyno

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Dec 7, 2008
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Still have world cup fever? Bored in the dregs of summer with little to watch until football season? Well you're in luck, this weekend Friday-Sunday, on NBC, NBCSN, and the Olympic channel, is the rugby 7s world cup, live from San Francisco. 24 mens teams and 16 womens teams playing single elimination matches roughly 15 minutes long. USA men have a real shot to win, coming in ranked 5th they aren't the favorites, but did win their home tournament in Vegas earlier this year and are healthy for the first time all year.

They also feature maybe the best player in the game, and one of the most exciting athletes most people have never heard of in Perry Baker, and world class sprinter Carlin Isles.


USA mens first match is the last match of the evening at roughly 1230am eastern Friday night/sat morning against the winner of Wales-Zimbabwe, which should be a fairly easy match before the tougher competition starts Saturday and hopefully Sunday. Fiji and South Africa are the 2 favorites. The USA women start early Friday afternoon.

As mentioned in the title Rugby 7s is the sport that Nate Ebner played in college, and briefly left the Patriots to play in several tournaments and then the Olympics for. The regular season normally runs from about December-June and includes 10 stops around the world, and USA finished 6th this year after battling injuries through much of the season. If you like football I recommend checking it out, great atmosphere, very fast paced, short matches, lots of action.

No idea how many people here watch already, but I don't remember ever seeing a rugby thread, or any talk other than a little during the Olympics. I got hooked after that and have watched every major tourney since (most of them at crazy hours overnight halfway around the world.)

If you're interested in the full schedule, teams or anything else the best place is here:
https://www.rwcsevens.com/schedule
 

InstaFace

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We had a Rugby World Cup thread in 2015 I believe. Bunch of SoSHers have apparently been to the southern hemisphere and caught a taste. That was Union, of course, not Sevens, but same universe.
 

Tokyo Sox

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Yeah we've definitely had a couple threads on it in the past. I've been to the Hong Kong Sevens about 16-17 times total, including the last 13 years in a row. The annual HK tournament adds kind of a mardi gras atmosphere to the whole thing for the weekend, with lots of people in costumes and many folks getting outrageously drunk, etc.

USA Sevens had a pretty disappointing weekend in HK back in April; since the Commonwealth Games were going on at the same time most of the big boys including Aus, NZ, England, S Africa all sent their top sides to that, with the B teams coming to HK. Of the big name countries, only Fiji sent their A-team, so expectations were high for the USA. Alas we lost badly in the quarterfinals to a young Kiwi B-team. A bunch of my buddies in Hong Kong are heading to SF this weekend to catch the tournament there. The US does generally seem to perform better at home, having won Vegas at least once, I think.

Carlin Isles is generally known as the fastest man in rugby, but Perry Baker is almost as fast and has become a much better rugby player. Isles has been "out of favor" as they say, and usually doesn't start. Baker is a threat to score every time he touches the ball.

Fun fact: Fiji had never won an Olympic medal of any kind, until Sevens made its Olympic debut in 2016, and they took home the gold.
 

jercra

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I go to the Sevens tourney in Vegas every year and the US had a great squad this year. I don't think there was a match even in doubt though Argentina in the finals was quite a shock. I expect the island teams (Fiji, Tonga, etc.) to be at their best for the WC but hoping the Eagles show up and make it to at least the semis. Going to have to figure out a way to watch some of the matches without paying more than I do for the Vegas tourney in person.
 
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scottyno

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Dec 7, 2008
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I go to the Sevens tourney in Vegas every year and the US had a great squad this year. I don't think there was a match even in doubt though Argentina in the finals was quite a shock. I expect the island teams (Fiji, Tonga, etc.) to be at their best for the WC but hoping the Eagles show up and make it to at least the semis. Going to have to figure out a way to watch some of the matches without paying more than I do for the Vegas tourney in person.
There's a bunch of really cheap tickets on stub hub for Friday, like $15-$25, probably from scalpers desperate to unload them at this point. The other days are much more pricey.

I was at the Vegas tourney this year too for the first time, they could have lost to Fiji, if not for Baker greatness and a Fiji yellow card, luckily they're on the other side of the bracket because they're certainly in top form right now (plus probably very upset that they didn't win the series).
 

jercra

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There's a bunch of really cheap tickets on stub hub for Friday, like $15-$25, probably from scalpers desperate to unload them at this point. The other days are much more pricey.

I was at the Vegas tourney this year too for the first time, they could have lost to Fiji, if not for Baker greatness and a Fiji yellow card, luckily they're on the other side of the bracket because they're certainly in top form right now (plus probably very upset that they didn't win the series).
Oh, I'd love to go to a couple of games in person but I'm in Denver so that's not happening. I was hoping a couple of games would be on TV without buying a crazy expensive package.
 

scottyno

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Oh, I'd love to go to a couple of games in person but I'm in Denver so that's not happening. I was hoping a couple of games would be on TV without buying a crazy expensive package.
Except the first round of the womens, which is only on the nbc rugby gold expensive package, every other match is on tv, assuming you have cable (not sure what cable package the Olympic channel is on, but I know I get it). If you don't have cable, if you have access to a friend or family members cable info I think you can watch the tv matches on the nbc sports app free.

 

jercra

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Oh, awesome. I have DirecTV so I should be able to get access. Thanks for the links.

Edit to add, Rugby sevens is a kick ass game. I hope people tune in. If you want fast paced with tons of athleticism, tons of scoring, great action and hardly any breaks in easily consumable 15 minute chunks, this a game you should check out.
 

Tokyo Sox

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Edit to add, Rugby sevens is a kick ass game. I hope people tune in. If you want fast paced with tons of athleticism, tons of scoring, great action and hardly any breaks in easily consumable 15 minute chunks, this a game you should check out.
For sure. Syd or someone will check in to say it’s not “real” rugby but who cares. Your description is spot-on.
 

scottyno

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Minimal drama on the men's side so far, all the favorites advanced, most pretty easily. USA will face Wales in the final match tonight on nbc sports.
 

scottyno

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Total domination by the USA men 35-0 including 2 vintage Perry Baker tries, they'll face a much tougher opponent in England tomorrow night in the QFs. The women had a tougher time of it, but they won twice today and will face probably the best team in the world in New Zealand tomorrow afternoon in the semi finals.

Also props to Scotland for scoring 31 unanswered in the final 5 minutes to beat Kenya 31-26, obviously not the same stage as the Super Bowl, but in terms of insanity that's probably less likely than 28-3.
 

scottyno

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Both team USAs were eliminated from main play today. The women put up a great fight losing close matches in the semis to eventual champ New Zealand and in the bronze match to Australia, the 2nd best team. USA was the only team to score a single point vs New Zealand in the tourney.

The men lost a heartbreaker to England 24-19 in overtime after a furious late comeback to tie it up. They'll play twice more tomorrow and will finish between 5th and 8th place, a respectable showing, but surely not what they were hoping for.
 

scottyno

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Just to close it out for completionist sake, even though this thread never really got off the ground, USA men dominated Scotland and then laid a massive egg vs Argentina to finish 6th, the same spot they finished on the series this year, so probably about right. Realistically they're somewhere between the 4th and 7th best on the circuit right now. The world cup wraps up a season that normally ends in June. Next men's tourney will be in December, espn had rights to every event this year and put them on espn+, so that's probably likely again next year. The women start up in October with a new series stop in Colorado.

And congrats to New Zealand, both the men and women disappointed a bit on the series this year, but won gold at both the commonwealth games and the world cup.
 

scottyno

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Felt the need to bump this thread one more time, because well, a lot has changed from the USA perspective. USA mens rugby is officially a world rugby 7s power, coming off 4 straight 2nd place finishes to start the series which puts them tied for 1st overall, they'll go for a 5th straight medal today in Las Vegas with a semifinal match vs co-series leader New Zealand, and then either a bronze or gold medal match. Semis are on espn+ (along with most of the series this year), and the final set of matches will be on espn 2 starting at 7 eastern.

If you're on the fence about rugby 7s and have espn+ watch yesterday's set of cup quarterfinals matches, 3 spectacular matches, and the 4th a USA complete dismantling of the 2 time defending series champ south africa.