USA Rugby

USA Rugby (officially the United States of America Rugby Football Union, Ltd.) is the national governing body for the sport of rugby union in the United States. Its role is to serve as "the national governing body charged with achieving and maintaining high levels of quality in all aspects of rugby." USA Rugby is responsible for the promotion and development of the sport in the U.S. and promotion of U.S. international participation.
USA Rugby was founded in 1975 as the United States of America Rugby Football Union, and it organized the first U.S. national team match in 1976. Today, USA Rugby has over 130,000 memberships, the largest segment being college rugby with over 32,000 members. USA Rugby oversees 1,200 high school teams, 900 college teams, 700 senior club teams, and 400 youth teams. USA Rugby administers all United States national teams: senior men's and women's teams, sevens teams for both men and women, and under-20 national teams for both sexes. The organization also sponsors college rugby for both sexes, although since the 2010–11 academic year the NCAA has designated women's rugby an emerging varsity sport.
USA Rugby is governed by an 11 member Board of Directors and four National Councils across Youth & High School, College, Senior Club and International Athlete and is led by CEO Ross Young. It is a member of World Rugby through membership with Rugby Americas North, and a member of the United States Olympic Committee. The headquarters for USA Rugby is located in Glendale, Colorado.
Recent achievements.
• In 2014, the U.S. Women's Sevens finished 4th in the World Rugby Women's Sevens World Series, their highest finish to date. 
• In 2017, the Women's U.S. National Team finished 4th at the Women's Rugby World Cup in Ireland. Their second highest finish since winning the 1991 tournament.
• In 2018, the United States hosted its first ever Rugby World Cup event with the Rugby World Cup Sevens 2018 in San Francisco at AT&T Park. The event welcomed more than 100,000 in attendance, setting the mark for highest attended Rugby World Cup Sevens to date.
Governance and leadership.
USA Rugby is governed by its board of directors and its congress. The board is composed of 9 members: 6 independent directors, 2 international athletes, and 1 representative from USA Rugby's Congress. Board members are: 
Gary Gold began his tenure as the head coach of the men's national team on January 1, 2018. 
Mike Friday is the head coach of the men's national sevens team.
Rob Cain was appointed as the Women's Eagles head coach in May 2018 earning his first victory again Ireland on November 18. Chris Brown is the head coach of the Women's Sevens team, who are currently ranked 2nd in the world through the 2018-19 Women's World Rugby Sevens Series.
International representation.
USA Rugby became a member of the International Rugby Football Board in 1987. The worldwide body would become the International Rugby Board (IRB) in 1998 and World Rugby in 2014. USA Rugby does not hold a vote on WR's 28 member Executive Council—the majority of votes are held by the 8 founding nations—although NACRA members collectively hold one vote on the Executive Council. In December 2011, for the first time, USA Rugby placed a representative on the 10-man executive committee. Bob Latham, in his role as chair of Rugby Americas North (RAN; known as NACRA before 2016), represents RAN on the executive committee.
USA Rugby also has relationships with international multi-sport organizations. USA Rugby is a member of the U.S. Olympic Committee and interacts with the International Olympic Committee. USA Rugby also interacts with the Pan American Sport Organization, and rugby has been a sport at the Pan Am Games since 2011.
Financials.
USA Rugby generally earns between $8 million to $16 million in annual revenues, with the majority of the revenue coming from (1) membership dues, (2) event revenue, (3) grants, and (4) sponsorship. Their principal expenses are (1) High Performance, (2) Men's National Team, and (3) Marketing and Fundraising. In 2010, USA Rugby paid over $200,000 each to its CEO Nigel Melville and its then head coach Eddie O'Sullivan. As of 2012, Nigel Melville's compensation was $250,000. USA Rugby experienced a financial crunch in 2016–2017, due to the bankruptcy of kit sponsor BLK and currency exchange rates that affect grants received from World Rugby.
USA Rugby lost more than $4.4 million in 2017 and $4.2 million in 2018. Most of the losses were attributed to USA Rugby Partners, formerly known as Rugby International Marketing (RIM), which was the majority owner of The Rugby Channel which was sold in 2018 to FloSports. In early 2020, with the outbreak of coronavirus, USA Rugby filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy to develop a financial restructuring plan. USA finished the Chapter 11 bankruptcy process as the Delaware Bankruptcy Court approved USA Rugby's debtor plan and the sport's National Governing Body. Effective September 1, 2020 USA rugby are officially a reorganized organization and started paying back creditors over the next five years. 
USA Rugby annual revenues are below, along with the components that generated the majority of revenue:
Notes: 
History.
The U.S. men's national team, the Eagles, won the Gold Medal in Olympic rugby in 1920 and 1924. After that time, rugby in the U.S. stagnated while continuing to grow in other parts of the world.
Beginning in the 1960s and continuing through the 1970s, the sport of rugby union enjoyed a renaissance in the USA. This created the need for a national governing body to represent the United States. On June 7, 1975, four territorial organizations (Pacific Coast, West, Midwest and East) gathered in Chicago, Illinois and formed the United States of America Rugby Football Union (now known as USA Rugby). USA Rugby then fielded its first national team on January 31, 1976 in a match against Australia in Anaheim, California, which Australia won 24–12.
In 1993, the Southern California RFU, a local area union of the Pacific Coast RFU, applied to become a separate territory. This was an impetus for others around the country to do the same, changing the make-up of USA Rugby, which now has seven territories (Pacific, Southern California, West, Midwest, South, Northeastern, and Mid-Atlantic).
USA Rugby lobbied for several years for participation in the IRB Sevens World Series. It was finally was awarded the annual USA Sevens tournament, beginning in 2004 with Los Angeles as the venue for the initial USA Sevens tournaments. In the summer of 2006, the tournament was moved to Petco Park in San Diego. Since 2010, the tournament has been held every year at Sam Boyd Stadium in Las Vegas and has been broadcast live on NBC.
USA Rugby is a Founding Sports Partner of the Sports Museum of America, joining more than 50 other single-sport Halls of Fame, national governing bodies, museums and other organizations across North America, to richly celebrate the history, grandeur and significance of sports in American culture. Opened in New York City on May 7, 2008, the Sports Museum of America showcases USA Rugby in its Hall of Halls Gallery, in return for their support of the creation of the Nation's first all-sports museum experience.
In 2014, USA Rugby created Rugby International Marketing, a for-profit company that is responsible for promoting the sport of rugby.
Board performance issues and turnover.
In a February 2017 assembly, the Board Chair Will Chang called for a vote of confidence in the Board from USA Rugby's Congress, which passed by a vote of 43–1. The sole Congress member, Steve Lewis, who voted no confidence in the Board, cited three issues — RIM's performance, the sanctioning of the PRO Rugby competition, and overspending by the high performance department. With RIM's financial performance continuing to deteriorate, in August 2017, Lewis proposed what was effectively a vote of no confidence in the Board, this time getting seven votes and a similar number of abstentions.
RIM's product “The Rugby Channel” which was supposed to be a money maker for USA Rugby, finished 2017 with $4.2 million in losses for the year.
Bankruptcy.
On March 31, 2020 the board of USA Rugby voted to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy as a result of "insurmountable financial constraints" in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic crisis. On August 31, 2020, the Delaware Bankruptcy Court approved USA Rugby's plan to reimburse its bankruptcy debts owed to creditors over five years effective the following day, allowing the governing body to exit bankruptcy and enter the post-bankruptcy phase.
National teams: The Eagles.
USA Rugby is responsible for organizing the various US national teams:
Professional rugby.
The Professional Rugby Organization, known as PRO Rugby, was a USA Rugby sanctioned American professional rugby union competition that played in 2016. This was the first professional rugby competition in North America. PRO played only the 2016 season, before it ceased operations as of January 2017.
Major League Rugby, another professional competition, was founded in late 2017. It began play in 2018 with seven teams, all in the U.S., and expanded to nine teams for the 2019 season, with one of the new teams in Canada. 2020 is expected to see 12 teams with East and West divisions.
While not yet professional, the top domestic competition for women's rugby in the US is the Women's Premier league (WPL) with 10 teams. The league just completed its 10th season.
Club competitions.
USA Rugby hosts two national championships in the club space. The Club National Championships in early June along with the Club 7s National Championship in mid August.
Rugby Super League, organized and sanctioned by USA Rugby, was the premier national level of men's club competition in the USA. It was founded in 1996, but ended play as of 2012 following the Great Recession. Following the demise of the Super League, the Pacific Rugby Premiership was formed in 2013, and began play in 2014 as the top level of men's club competition in the U.S.
The USA Rugby club structure sees the United States divided into two leagues: West and East.
Within each league there are four conferences, with the winners of each conference's division advancing to the league semifinals, and the two league champions competing in the national championship.
East: Atlantic North, Mid-Atlantic, Midwest, Southern
West: Pacific North, Pacific South, Frontier, Red River
College rugby.
USA Rugby hosts 5 total championship competitions annually. The Men's Division 1-A, Women's D1 Elite, Spring College, Fall College and College 7s Championships.
The Collegiate Rugby Championship is a rugby sevens competition that has been held every year in June since 2010. The tournament is the highest profile college rugby tournament in the U.S., and is broadcast live on NBC every year from PPL Park in Philadelphia. Every year, the number of spectators increase, and in 2015 the College Rugby Championship broke an attendance record at over 24,000 spectators, which shows how the popularity of the sport is expanding.
State Governing Bodies.
State Governing Bodies are responsible for developing an administrative structure with the objective of promoting the development of youth rugby within their state. They are also responsible for day-to-day governance, including organizing league structures, collecting dues, implementing a state championship, and conducting rugby outreach. USA Rugby has 44 state rugby organizations.
Hall of Fame.
World Rugby Hall of Fame.
The following have been inducted into the World Rugby Hall of Fame:
U.S. Rugby Hall of Fame.
To date, 68 individuals and three teams who have made a lasting impression on rugby in the United States, have been inducted into the U.S. Rugby Hall of Fame. For full bios of all the inductees and for more information about the U.S. Rugby Hall of Fame, visit: usrugbyhalloffame.org.
Coaching.
USA Rugby oversees the coaching of the game. USA Rugby requires coaches to register and complete a certification course.
Geographical unions.
USA Rugby organizes amateur registered rugby teams into thirteen geographical unions at the senior club level. High school and youth teams affiliate with State Rugby Organizations while college teams register with either Geographical Unions or College Conferences.
The current Geographical Unions are:
The following states are not currently covered by a geographic union:
Past leaders.
Elected governance history.
In June 1987, the position of Chairman of the Board was added to the executive committee, and Bob Watkins was named to that position. Effective June 1989, that position was retitled Post of Past President, and remained an appointed post until the position was dropped in 1996.
Effective January 1996, an executive vice president was added.
Effective March 2000, the Vice President was replaced with Athlete Vice President.
Effective April 2004, the President title was replace with Chairman, and an USARRA Representative was added.
Effective July 14, 2006 the governance was changed to a model with a board of directors nominated and approved by a congress.
National office.
The governing body of USA Rugby opened a national office on June 3, 1988. The office has been headed by: