The Toronto Arrows signed James O’Neill for the 2022 Major league Rugby season. The 23-year-old flanker(24 in January) is 6’3″ and 230 lbs.
James, who is from Cochrane, Alberta, arrived at the Arrows earlier this offseason when the club acquired his rights via a trade with Los Angeles. The trade involved sending Canadian National Team co-captain Ben LeSage to the Giltinis with the Arrows receiving salary cap considerations. He was taken 26th overall in the 2021 MLR Collegiate Draft, becoming the third Canadian to be picked in the selection event.
The flanker is a graduate of the University of Victoria, where he attended from 2016-2021. He captained his Vikes side to the Canadian University Men’s Rugby Championship title in 2019 alongside Arrows 2021 first-round draft pick Logan Martin-Feek.
James palyed for Canada at two World Rugby Under-20 Trophy tournaments, in 2017, and again in 2018 with the captaincy role.
This Fall he was the captain of the Pacific Pride in the British Columbia’s Coastal Cup, where he helped lead the Rugby Canada national development academy side to a second-place finish (4-1-1 record) in the inaugural year of the competition. The Alberta native played his club rugby with the Calgary Canucks.
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