USA Rugby World Cup Squad Named for Japan

USA Rugby Release by Aalini Tabani

Head Coach Gary Gold names 18 forwards and 13 backs with 677 cumulative test caps

The No. 13 USA Men’s National Team XVs officially announce the 31-player squad for Rugby World Cup Japan 2019.

Head Coach Gary Gold has named 18 forwards and 13 backs with 10 players having previously competed in a Rugby World Cup (RWC). Three will look ahead to their third World Cup event including Captain Blaine Scully, Eric Fry, and Thretton Palamo. Scully and Fry both competed in 2011 and 2015 while Palamo competed in 2007 as the youngest player in history to appear in an RWC event and 2015.

The group features three Rio 2016 Olympians including Nate Augspurger, Martin Iosefo and Ben Pinkelman. Pinkelman and Iosefo were both recently instrumental in leading the USA Men’s Sevens program to their most successful season in history.

More than half of the named squad began playing rugby at the youth level (middle school and earlier) with another 12 picking up the sport in high school and three doing so in college. A total of 29 players can be considered multi-sport athletes, having played in an official program for a sport other than rugby at one point in their athletic career.

The full squad features 677 cumulative test caps.

Head Coach Gary Gold said: “We’ve picked a pretty balanced team, we’ve gone with 18 forwards and 13 backs. We think that the attrition for this Rugby World Cup, especially our pool, is going to take it out of our forwards, so we’ve gone with an extra forward. We’ve got good depth in almost every position, I think we’re well covered. Where I think we are very lucky is that we’ve got quite a few guys who can play in multiple positions. From that point of view, we thought long and hard about those combinations and how we can best make up the combinations for the squad and what’s going to be a rather attritious pool.”

As the ninth edition of the quadrennial event, the World Cup will run from September 20 – November 2 with the Eagles drawn in Pool C against England (No. 3), France (No. 8), Argentina (No. 11) and Tonga (No. 15).

The United States men have appeared in all but one Rugby World Cup event (1995) with three total wins in the group stages including Japan in 1987 and 2003, as well as Russia in 2011.

In the four years since the last World Cup in England, the Eagles have improved from a 3-5 test match record in 2016 to a 9-1 test match record in 2018. The team will go into Japan 6-2 in test matches this year.

USA FORWARDS

NAME	POSITION	CLUB	CAPS
David Ainu’u	Prop	Toulouse	8
Malon Al-Jiboori	Flanker	Unattached	5
Nate Brakeley	Lock	Rugby United New York	21
Nick Civetta	Lock	Unattached	23
Cam Dolan	No. 8	NOLA Gold	47
Dylan Fawsitt	Hooker	Rugby United New York	12
Eric Fry	Prop	Vannes	45
Hanco Germishuys	Flanker	Glendale Raptors	17
James Hilterbrand	Hooker	Manly Marlins	19
Olive Kilifi	Prop	Seattle Seawolves	27
Tony Lamborn	Flanker	Melbourne Rebels (AUS) Hawke’s Bay Magpies (NZL)	19
Titi Lamositele	Prop	Saracens	28
Ben Landry	Lock	Ealing Trailfinders	22
Paul Mullen	Prop	Unattached	14
Gregory Peterson	Lock	Newcastle Falcons	26
Ben Pinkelman	Flanker	USA Sevens	1
John Quill	Flanker	Rugby United New York	36
Joseph Taufete’e	Hooker	Worcester Warriors	23

USA BACKS

NAME	POSITION	CLUB	CAPS
Blaine Scully (C)	Wing	Unattached	50
Nate Augspurger	Scrumhalf / Wing	San Diego Legion	24
Marcel Brache	Center/Wing	Western Force	19
Bryce Campbell	Center	London Irish	28
Shaun Davies	Scrumhalf	Glendale Raptors	25
Ruben De Haas	Scrumhalf	Free State Cheetahs	13
Will Hooley	Fullback	Bedford Blues	12
Martin Iosefo	Wing	USA Sevens	6
Paul Lasike	Center	Harlequins	16
AJ MacGinty	Flyhalf	Sale Sharks	24
Will Magie	Flyhalf	Unattached	25
Thretton Palamo	Center	Houston SaberCats	18
Mike Te’o	Wing	San Diego Legion	24

USA STAFF

BROADCAST INFORMATION

Rugby World Cup Japan 2019 will be broadcast LIVE across NBC Sports properties in the United States. A total of 26 matches will be aired on NBCSN linear television network including all USA pool games and the Final on November 2nd. Fans can watch every game LIVE and on-demand through the NBC Sports Gold package available for purchase here.