Through the Looking Glass Continued…10 Years!

We’re celebrating 10 years of YSC and tonight we wanted to look back at a few more memories. We’ve already looked back at our early partners, but these memories are a bit more personal!

In 2009 we were contacted by Ali Donnely who was launching ScrumQueens, a new women’s rugby site in the UK. We exchanged many emails and in 2010 finally met when Ali put us up for the Women’s Rugby World Cup. ScrumQueens has grown quickly over the years and has become an integral part of women’s rugby today.

Firstly congratulations on 10 fantastic years of covering our great game!When I started Scrumqueens.com up in 2009, I was looking around to get advice from anyone involved in the game and also to learn from the competition. I quickly learned that when it came to websites that provided coverage of women’s rugby – the competition was pretty light.

YSC, Wendy and Traci were the exception to the rule and I got in touch rather nervously asking if they would pass on any thoughts for what I was trying to do for the test game. Luckily for me. they were both fantastic and have become friends over the years – staying with us in London during the 2010 World Cup and staying in contact ever since.

The USA women’s game in its landscape and structure is complex and YSC cuts through it and provides great coverage for all aspects of it. Wendy and Traci remain my go to contacts for any women’s rugby insight into the USA game and they shine a light on the inner workings of the game there while also broadening out to a more global game.

There are lots of people who think they could do a really great job covering women’s rugby but there are very few people who actually go and do it for a sustained period, so YSC deserves massive credit for keeping it going so strongly for 10 years.

Here’s to 10 more!

Along our journey we met so many awesome ruggers, but a particularly special one was Karlla Davis from Brazil. She started out working with several International rugby blogs (bringing them women’s rugby news!), then moved to NYC where she played and became a rugby referee. Karlla also became one of our collaborators in 2012.

For me the YSC meant a lot. When I started playing rugby I started to look around and looked for information focused on women rugby development. Your website was the first specialized one I found. Since that time (back in 2006) I didnt stop looking all the news and got inspired with the hard work putted in there.

One day I decided to create my own website and isn’t not a surprise for you (I told you in person) my ideas and how we saw women in rugby was inspired on your point of view. We wanted talk about rugby and about athletes and our purpose was not get the “fragile” or “girly”aspect of be a woman that plays rugby.

It was a big honor and surprise for me when you invited me to be a part of the YSC team. I wish I had the energy to write more, but as you can see my english skills still very poor.

The most important part for me was the friendship created. When I met Tracy, then I met you, and we all could hang out in our fantastic community, we shared the field and the passion of been rugby referees.

I wish you and all YSC team lots of happiness and lots of hard work in and out the field.

– Karlla Davis

Another great rugger we met along the way was Martin Charvat from the Czech Republic. Martin runs http://www.zenskeragby.cz/ and http://www.facebook.com/CzechWomensRugby and is one of the only websites supporting Czech women’s rugby. While Martin believes that his contribution has been small, he has brought a perspective that we wouldn’t have had otherwise!

My contribution to YSC is really small. I am just informing what interesting is happening here in Central Europe (and what is usually under the radar of big rugby media). I hope it helps rugby here and it also shows to other rugby enthusiasts everywhere that doesn’t matter how small is your rugby community. Important is how big is your heart. That’s what matters. 🙂

Our site has always seeked additional writers to help give different perspectives and opinions. Grant Cole joined our collaborators program in 2012 and quickly made an impact. He now runs This is Texas Rugby and contributes to several other rugby sites and blogs. Grant has and continues to be a huge supporter of rugby and particularly women’s rugby. His passion is always a refresher and a stark difference to those that could care less about women’s rugby.

I don’t know how I helped, but I am glad to have performed a service for the segment of rugby that is most dear to my heart and that is, in this writer’s opinion, a under-appreciated and overly-important piece of the American Rugby Community – Women’s Rugby. A rugby athlete for Texas A&M’s Women’s Rugby Club introduced me to rugby in 1984. She was a student teacher in my World History class at my alma mater, Bryan HS (sadly, I cannot remember her name). She had a few of us meet her at the public library (which had a satellite dish) to watch the USARFU Club Nat’l Championship of Los Angeles RFC v Dallas Harlequins RFC. Only one of the attendees fell in love with rugby that day and it has been a great trip for me.

There are too few people who understand how difficult it is to maintain a web presence as a no-profit, no-income, little-acknowledgement rugby news site. Of those, there are even fewer females who understand. YSC’s work has been influential and inspirational to me on days when I thought keeping up with the ruggers might not be worth the lack of sleep, the spouse chiding me for spending more time with my “girlfriend” (her term for rugby), the vehicles breakdowns on roadtrips, or any number of other hardships endured.

Now, others are stepping into this women’s rugby news arena. As you look at those new sites popping up, take pride in the fact that they are all standing on the foundation you laid when you started YSC.

Early on in the formation of the Women’s Premier League, Alex Williams reached out to us to see if we could help provide media coverage. Over the years we continued to work with Dre Khoury providing match reports and videos for the WPL. We have continued working with Dre over the years and most recently she recommended Wendy for the USA Rugby 2020 Strategy Development committee.

YSC has been the primary source of women’s rugby news for many in the rugby community. As an administrator for several teams and leagues, I often look to YSC for up to date match results and club standings. YSC successfully solicits outside writers to bring unique perspective to game analysis. Women rugby players can receive unbiased, thoughtful commentary on recent developments in USA Rugby. YSC helped to bring women’s rugby to mainstream media. I’m excited to celebrate YSC‘s 10 year anniversary. Congratulations!!

– Dre Khoury, USA Rugby Club Strategic Committee