The Lewis & Clark Rugby M (Men’s+) and W (Women’s+) Teams have been participating in tournaments around Portland and the Pacific Northwest this year. The season has been a period of development for the program, which is combined with Reed College, to maintain the numbers needed for a full roster.
The team has kept up consistent practices between the two schools, focusing on technical instruction. The most recent tournament occurred on Saturday, Feb. 28 at Reed.
Indya Swanson ’29 and Ellie Crall ’29, who joined the program in Fall 2025, discussed the trajectory of the season, practice schedule and the culture of the W Team in interviews with The Mossy Log.
Crall highlighted her experience during the fall semester.
“At first, there (were) a lot of people and then it slowly dropped off, but I really like playing with Reed. I think the team was very tight knit, especially the Reed people. It’s a very tight-knit little community because there’s so few of us,” Crall said. “We played two tournaments in the fall … and tied one game and lost the rest of them.”
The weekly commitment involves four scheduled practices, although most players attend two. Tournaments occur on weekends, with Reed often hosting.
Swanson spoke about the practice schedule and drills, shedding light on how practices are typically run.
“The biggest practice is at Reed on Sundays from 12 to 2, and that’s when most of the Reed players will be there and most of LC. You can do more when you have more people — more drills and larger or small scaling touch scrimmages, different types of contact drills or passing skills,” Swanson said. “Then there’s this hour of skills, like 9 to 10 on Thursdays, and then also at Reed from 4 to 6, but that’s more difficult for people to make.”
Crall built off of Swanson’s description of the schedule.
“We have two practices at Reed a week and one practice at LC, and at the Reed practices, we run drills, and we do touch scrimmages, and then sometimes we have skill-based ones or practice kicking and lifts and other things. And sometimes we have captain-run (practices), and then we just do very specific skills,” Crall said.
Swanson elaborated on the dynamic of practices.
“(Practices are) very chill. Everyone’s very friendly and wants to be there. I’m enjoying it. It’s not super strict on, necessarily, attendance or anything. If you don’t attend practice, you won’t get played, but other than that, it’s not super strict,” Swanson said.
Crall proceeded to describe the team’s culture.
“There’s so few of us,” Crall said. “It’s very loosely structured because we have two different schools in our division, but I think everyone who’s there is very dedicated, and everyone loves it. And everyone is just very kind and nice to each other, and it’s a very inclusive sport.”
Swanson brought up some recent challenges related to scheduling. Flexibility has been a significant factor in the team’s operation this year.
“(The season has) been good, but two of our three tournaments got canceled. But we have one rescheduled, and I think we’re playing well as a team,” Swanson said.
Swanson gave the rundown of a typical tournament.
“It’s sevens tournaments and there’s three teams we usually play against, for the W team at least, which is Willamette and Western Oregon University and Puget Sound University. Each game is 14 minutes long and the halves are seven minutes, but it’s a full field and seven people on the field at a time. So we just play three short games in a tournament,” Swanson said. “When we went to (University of Puget Sound), it’s a couple hour drive, so we had to leave around 8, but (games) usually don’t start until 12 or 1, so it’s not super early.”
Despite not feeling confident about the prospects of winning the upcoming tournament, Swanson believes that the team has experienced measurable growth throughout the year and is becoming more cohesive.
“I think we will not win, but we played really well. We’re getting better as a team,” Swanson said. “It’s just bragging rights. If you win, it doesn’t really continue on. All the teams are more playing because they love this sport and less for where it’s gonna take them.”
Regardless of the more casual social atmosphere, the sport is still physically demanding. Crall, who also plays on LC’s ultimate frisbee team Artemis, compared the effort required for both teams.
“It’s more tiring than I expected because the game’s only 15 minutes long. It’s hard sprinting for all of the both halves and so it gets tiring very fast,” Crall said. “Getting tackled to the ground all the time is very tiring. … I think (rugby) is harder than frisbee, physically.”
The physical nature of the sport requires players to learn a variety of movements, including the mechanics of scrums, the restarting of a play after a minor infringement where all forwards pack close together; kicks, an alternative to throwing the ball to another player or running with it; and lineouts, the restarting of a play after the ball has gone off the field, where a player is typically lifted off the ground by another player to gain possession.
“There’s a lot of different weird components that I don’t know. You have to learn separately if you’re doing lifts. I’ve had to like lift someone up when you throw back in. Or the scrums, and different types of kicks and then also passing them with different strategies,” Swanson said.
The program is overseen by three coaches, with this year’s leadership provided by LC captains Natasha Engelhardt ’27 and Wim Castellano ’27 and Reed captains Roberto Velez, Nina Friedman and Elsa Aguilar Tessandori. Despite the division of the program caused by the split campuses, the captains work hard to maintain an environment that prioritizes safety, cohesion and inclusion.
Both of the rugby teams will be participating in their next tournament at Reed on Saturday, April 11. As the team prepares for its rescheduled tournament, the LC and Reed partnership continues to be an inclusive and friendly athletic outlet for students seeking a physical challenge.
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