NOLA Gold Rugby Club re-signed Ross Depperschmidt for the 2021 Major League Rugby season. The 28-year-old center is 6’0″ and 215 lbs.
In 2020, Ross played 138 minutes in 2 matches, starting once, during the Covid-19 shortened MLR season. In 2019 he did not feature in any regular-season matches. Ross started at the inside center for NOLA Gold Academy against USA Rugby South in November.
Ross is from Flower Mound, Texas, and attended Edward S. Marcus High School where he played football and baseball. He then went to the University of Alabama from 2012-2016, earning a Bachelor’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering and continued a the University and earned a Master’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering in 2018.
Ross played rugby while at Alabama and was the co-captain of the team from 2015-2017, the Vice President from 2015-2016, Alumni Chairperson in 2016-2017, and Assistant Coach in 2017-2018. The team won the Southeastern Collegiate Rugby Conference Championship in 2016 and came in second the year before. In 2016 he was named to the 1st team All-Conference and was the SCRC Player of the Year.
Ross has played representative rugby for USARugby South against the Capital Rugby Union Selects in December 2017 and Spring 2018. He also went on the USARS tour to Austria, Hungary, and the Czech Republic in 2018. Prior to that tour, he played rugby in Matamata, New Zealand.
Ross then joined New Orleans Rugby Club for the 2018-2019 season and played in a NOLA Gold A preseason match. He signed with NOLA Gold later in the 2019 season but did not play in any matches.
In August 2019 he played with NOLA Gold at the Rugbytown 7s with the team earning third place.
NOLA Gold 2021 Comments
Ryan Fitzgerald, General Manager said that “Ross gets what it takes to be a professional. He was voted by his teammates last year for our ‘Heart of Gold’ player (hardest worker) and he proves it day in and day out. He continues to improve on the pitch daily and is a 1st class teammate. Ross is the type of guy that can fit in anywhere he went, but sure are glad to have him back in GOLD.”
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