From the Pitch to the Beach

Long after the final whistle of their collegiate careers, the FGCU rugby experience didn't end for many former players.

It simply changed venues.

What started as a group of FGCU graduates getting together to play beach rugby evolved into something much bigger: an alumni rugby tradition that has brought former Eagles together for more than a decade, taking them from the beaches of Southwest Florida to tournaments thousands of miles away.

From Beerfoot Beach Rugby in Fort Myers, Florida, to Midnight Sevens in Alaska, FGCU rugby alumni have continued to find ways to stay connected through the sport that brought them together in college.

Where It All Started: The Beach

Rugby has always been about more than the 80 minutes on the pitch.

For the players who came through FGCU Rugby, it became a community — friendships formed at practice, on game days, during road trips, and after matches. When those players graduated, many weren't ready to leave that community behind.

Beach rugby provided the answer.

The relaxed atmosphere of summer tournaments offered former players a way to return to the game without the demands of a traditional collegiate season. A few former teammates could get together, put together a roster, find a tournament, and spend a weekend playing rugby and catching up with old friends.

One tournament became another.

And another.

What began as an alumni reunion gradually became an alumni team.

The beach became home.

Building an Alumni Team

Over the years, FGCU graduates began traveling together to beach rugby tournaments throughout Florida and beyond. The roster might change from tournament to tournament, with former players coming out of retirement for a weekend, current alumni joining longtime teammates, and new generations of Eagles meeting the players who came before them.

The result was something uniquely FGCU.

The alumni team wasn't simply a collection of former rugby players. It became a rolling reunion — a group connected by a university, a rugby club, and years of shared experiences.

Players who had graduated years earlier could put on an FGCU jersey again and immediately feel like they were back with the team.

The competition mattered, but so did everything surrounding it.

The road trips. The beach. The stories. The reunions. The teammates who hadn't seen each other in years. The players who traveled hundreds or thousands of miles just to spend a weekend playing rugby with their friends.

And eventually, the trips started getting much bigger.

From Fort Myers to the Rest of the Country

Southwest Florida provided the foundation.

Tournaments such as Beerfoot Beach Rugby in Fort Myers gave the alumni team a familiar home base and an opportunity to bring together generations of FGCU players.

But once the travel bug took hold, there was no reason to stop at the Florida coastline.

The FGCU alumni began taking their rugby show on the road.

Beach rugby tournaments became destinations. Former Eagles traveled across the country to compete, reconnect, and represent the university and the rugby club.

The locations changed.

The teammates changed.

The years passed.

But the tradition continued.

Over more than a decade, FGCU rugby alumni have traveled together for tournaments and events throughout the country, proving that a player's relationship with rugby doesn't necessarily end when the college years do.

In many cases, that's when another chapter begins.

Rugby Under the Midnight Sun

Few destinations demonstrate just how far the FGCU alumni tradition has traveled better than Alaska.

Midnight Sevens became one of those unforgettable rugby destinations — the kind of tournament that makes for a story before the first match even begins.

For players accustomed to Florida beaches and the heat of Southwest Florida, traveling to Alaska to play rugby was about as far from home as you could get.

And yet, the same thing that brought them together in Fort Myers brought them to Alaska: rugby.

There is something uniquely special about traveling across the country with a group of former teammates to play a sport you have loved for years. The distance becomes part of the experience.

Fort Myers.

Alaska.

And everywhere in between.

The jersey remains the connection.

More Than an Alumni Team

The FGCU alumni rugby tradition is about more than tournament results.

It represents something that is often difficult to quantify in college sports: the lasting impact of a club.

A university rugby team can give a student four years of competition. But a strong rugby community can give them friendships that last decades.

Players graduate. Careers begin. Families grow. People move across the country. Life gets busy.

Yet every so often, someone sends the message:

"Who's playing this weekend?"

And suddenly, former Eagles are making travel plans again.

That's the power of rugby.

The alumni team has become a bridge between generations of FGCU players. Former teammates continue playing together, younger alumni meet older generations, and players who may have never shared the collegiate pitch get the chance to wear the same colors.

It keeps the history of FGCU Rugby alive.

A Tradition Worth Continuing

Today, the story of FGCU Rugby is entering another chapter.

The collegiate program is working toward rebuilding and re-forming its men's and women's teams, with the goal of returning to the competitive collegiate rugby community.

The alumni tradition provides an important reminder of what can happen when a rugby club becomes more than just a sports team.

It becomes a family.

The players who built FGCU Rugby's early history didn't simply walk away when they graduated. They carried the club with them — onto beaches, into tournament grounds, across state lines, and eventually across the country.

From Beerfoot Beach Rugby in Fort Myers to Midnight Sevens in Alaska, the FGCU rugby alumni have spent more than a decade proving that the final whistle of a college career doesn't have to be the end of the story.

Sometimes, it's just the beginning of the road trip.

And wherever that road leads next, there will probably be an FGCU jersey, a rugby ball, and a group of former Eagles ready to play.