One of the largest rugby sevens tournaments on the East Coast will take place July 4-5 at Ogden Park. The Cape Fear men’s and women’s rugby clubs will play teams from all over the southeast region during the Cape Fear Sevens Tournament.
Each sevens game consists of two seven-minute halves and both teams have seven players in the game at a time.
Leah Stilwell, president of the Cape Fear Women’s Rugby Club, hopes the tournament will motivate more women to play rugby.
“We’re a growing team, and we’d love to have anyone who’s interested come out. Even if they don’t know what a rugby ball looks like, now is the time to try it. … We have people who the first time they touched a rugby ball was at practice,” she said.
Stilwell started playing rugby when she was a senior at North Mecklenburg High School in Charlotte, North Carolina, when a friend encouraged her to join the school’s club team.
“She kept talking about how awesome it was,” Stilwell said. “I ended up quitting soccer and playing rugby the second semester of my senior year.”
Stilwell went on to start a club rugby team during her freshman year at the University of North Carolina Wilmington. She encouraged her roommate, Mindy Benincasa, to try the sport.
Benincasa is now the vice president of the Cape Fear Women’s Rugby Club.
“Once you finish up with high school and college, there aren’t many sports you can play and hang out with a great group of girls,” Benincasa said.
Benincasa encourages both novice and experienced athletes to try rugby.
“We have positions for any body type and any skill level,” she said.
Stilwell said the players range in age from 18 to mid-40s.
“UNCW plays with us for the summer season,” she said. “We’ve also had players in their mid-40s come out and they’ve been amazing players.”
Stilwell said she and her 29 teammates will travel as far as Chattanooga, Tenn., for a tournament during the sevens season, while still looking to expand their roster.
“We also play in Georgia and South Carolina,” she said.
The Cape Fear Sevens Tournament will take place 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, July 4 and Sunday, July 5.
For more information about the Cape Fear Women’s Rugby Club, visit www.capefearwomensrugby.org
To learn more about the Cape Fear Sevens Tournament, go to www.fear7s.com
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