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Tomorrow brings the unusual combination of “Super Tuesday” as well as “Fat Tuesday”. Some will be blowing it out in New Orleans, getting all of their sins out of their system before lent. Others will be voting in primary elections. Maybe they’re the same thing (hey - it’s an easy joke!). For me, Mardi Gras always meant rugby.

It has been 22 years since I made my first trip down to New Orleans for the annual LSU Mardi Gras Rugby Tournament. I never really intended to go to Mardi Gras (I didn’t even know what it was), much less play rugby. But I didn’t get much playing time during the Saturday football games and my roommate was helping to start the first Rhodes College rugby team. I went to one or two practices, just for fun, but didn’t give it much thought. It seemed like backyard football to me.

One Sunday morning in the fall of 1985, after having too much fun at some late night party, Rock ‘em Sock ‘em Rusty B. barged into my room and announced that I was needed for that day’s rugby game. We were playing Ole Miss. I quietly complained about the noise, the light and my pounding headache. Clearly, that was not the right answer. Rusty yanked me out of bed, tossed my cleats in my direction and said something along the lines of, “Get yer ass up and get dressed - you’re playing!”

Rusty was about 6′3″ and weighed in at 275 lbs. He was a starting offensive tackle on Saturdays. At the time, I was a strapping 162 lbs. and, although I was speedy, I couldn’t escape his demands.

Within an hour, I was reluctantly on the field. The Ole Miss game quickly had me sweating, however, and I felt less crappy as the game went on. I didn’t know the rules and was called for a number of penalties such as diving on a loose ball and ‘knocking on’ - i.e. dropping a ball forward. I was certain that this would be my last game. I really didn’t enjoy penalizing my team every few minutes.

The game was tied 0-0 and the clock was winding down. Ole Miss was getting ready to score and it looked like we were doomed. But one of the Rebel players tried to turn the corner on my side when I tackled him, picked up the ball and sprinted the distance of the field for a try. The whistle blew and we won 3-0. I was hooked!

A few weeks later, we took the ultimate road trip to Baton Rouge where we played rugby by day and went to Mardi Gras parades in New Orleans at night. That was my first trip to the Big Easy and many more were to follow. The LSU Mardi Gras Rugby Tournament became a staple road trip. Here’s a great video one of my old teammates just sent me comparing rugby to soccer. I don’t remember it being quite so much like the UFC, but the home team always did supply the keg.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 4th, 2008 at 10:37 pm and is filed under Life, People. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.