There are a handful of states that contest their primary championship seasons in the fall, and so they are dealing with Covid-19 implications now. Wisconsin and Michigan award 15s titles in the fall, and the former is still considering a season (read more). Colorado’s lone competition block for the girls occurs in the fall, but the recently announced CHSAA schedule shift has moved all contact sports to the new year, and although rugby is not a state-sponsored sport, fall 7s will surely be impacted.
In Iowa, girls’ high schools play to a 7s championship in the fall (like Colorado, there is no 15s league), but the Iowa Youth Rugby Association board announced that it will postpone that competition until spring 2021.
PRESS RELEASE
Due to factors relating to COVID-19 and USA Rugby reorganization, the Iowa Youth Rugby Association Board of Directors has postponed the Fall Girl’s 2020 Season.
Please read the information below that led to this decision.
The COVID-19 pandemic presents many obstacles in returning to play, including return to play protocols and positive case numbers/projections.
Length of Season. Ensuring player preparedness and safety requires ample practice time. Once the registration process has been completed, there needs to be sufficient time for practices, with emphasis on tackling. This will delay the start of a season, which will shorten the length of the girl’s season. Without having complete information, it makes it difficult to properly plan the girl’s season. For this reason, we will not be holding a girl’s fall season in 2020.
Insurance. There cannot be any practices or competitions until we have insurance coverage. The new entity for youth rugby in the United States is USA Youth & HS Rugby. Because they are new, they are working to secure insurance coverage for the league. We have been asked to hold off on registrations until September. Once we have all of the new information, we will have to update our registration process. This may take up to a week to process.
Spring 2021 Season. With that in mind, and after reviewing the survey responses of the players and coaches, we are delaying the girl’s season until Spring 2021 to potentially run concurrently with the boys’ season. We are currently working out the specifics and structure. This is an evolving situation and new territory for the Iowa Youth Rugby Association and USA Youth & HS Rugby. We are working hard to ensure a league structure with safety and quality of play at the forefront of our processes. We would ask you to hold any questions you may have until the general layout of the league and State Tournament have been determined.
Please reach out if you have any questions. We will continue to work through this together.
With You,
Iowa Youth Rugby Association Board