NOLA Gold Rugby Club re-signed Cam Dolan for the 2023 Major League Rugby season. The 32-year-old lock/No.8 is from Fort Myers, Florida, and is 6’6″ and 245 lbs.
Cam played 1233 minutes in 16 starts and scored one try for NOLA Gold in 2022. He then played in the Toyota Challenge in South Africa for the USA Falcons against the Toyota Cheetahs and the Pumas. Then he was off to Dubai for the World Rugby 2023 Rugby World Cup Final Qualifier Tournament against Kenya, Hong Kong, and Portugal.
Cam started all five matches during the Covid-19 shortened MLR season, playing 400 minutes and scoring four tries. He started against the Houston SaberCats during the 2021 preseason match.
Cam played 763 minutes in 10 starts during the 2019 MLR season and had three tries. He had 76 carries for 447 meters, made 113 tackles, and had 38 lineout takes with 4 steals. In 2018 he played 480 in his six starts with San Diego Legion.
According to Stephen Sheehan of the Florida Rugby Union, Dolan comes from an athletic family and played roller hockey as an 8-year-old. While Dolan attended Palmetto Ridge High School he played freshman football and threw a 45-yard touchdown strike on his first play. After that season he never played football again and turned to rugby with the Naples Bears.
It took only six weeks of playing rugby with the Naples Bears before his talents were recognized and he was selected for the USA National Team Under-17s in 2007 and 2008 for the Under-18s.
He then went to Life University in 2009 and graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration. He was a four-time Collegiate All-American and went on rugby tours to South Africa, California, and Ireland. He also played rugby sevens in the Collegiate Rugby Championship in 2012 and 2013 and was named to the All-Tournament team. The team won the National Championship in 2013.
Dolan also played USA age-grade rugby for the Under-20s and played in the 2009 World Rugby Trophy competition as captain. He also represented the USA All-American in 2013 at the Pacific Nations Cup and in the 2012 Americas Rugby Championship in Ontario.
In 2011 he was selected to the National Men’s Sevens team and played that year in London and Edinburgh.
Dolan also has played a prominent role for the USA Rugby Men’s National 15s team and is Eagle 443. He has 37 caps, starting 27 times, and has scored 11 tries. He played in all four matches in the 2015 Rugby World Cup.
Dolan made his Eagles debut against Fiji at Nagoya, on Jun 19, 2013. His last test was on October 13, 2019, at the Rugby World Cup. He played all 8 matches in the 2015 and 2019 Rugby World Cups. After the November internationals, he is the most capped current USA player with 63 caps.
He also played in a non-test match against the Maori All-Blacks in November 2013 in Chester, PA. The match was seen by Jim Mallinder, Head Coach of the Northampton Saints, and earned him a professional English Premier League contract, from January 2014-July to 2015.
Dolan then switched teams and played PRO 12 Rugby with the Cardiff Blues from Oct. 2015 through the end of the season in 2017. He then returned to the U.S. and joined Old Blue of New York for the American Rugby Premiership Fall season.
In 2018 Dolan moved to California to play with the inaugural 2018 Major League Rugby San Diego Legion and was dominant in the lineouts.
Following the MLR season, he signed a short-term contract with the Greene-King IPA Championship Nottingham Club and 2019 with NOLA Gold Rugby for the Major League Rugby 2019 season. Since then, he signed a contract extension through the 2022 season.
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