The penultimate weekend of the 2026 Major League Rugby regular season is behind us, and with just 1 weekend of games left before the postseason begins, three of the four playoff spots have been decided but only one of them is locked in. The California Legion and Seattle Seawolves are still fighting over the final home playoff spot in 2nd, while the three teams at the bottom of the standings are fighting for survival, with the defending champion New England Free Jacks, Old Glory DC, and Anthem RC (mathematically, at least) all battling it out for the last remaining place!
Welcome back to Midweek Milestones, the weekly article series that dives deeper into some of the standout stats from the latest round of MLR action! Round 10 gave us another 3 cracking games including arguably the game of the season so far between Old Glory DC and the Chicago Hounds and as regular readers of these articles will know, every MLR gameday throws out a bunch of interesting numbers, standout stats, and Midweek Milestones!
Appearance Achievements
Round 10 saw a MLR collegiate draftee earn his 50th appearance in the competition, becoming the 6th Collegiate Draftee to reach a half-century of appearances, and just the 2nd from his draft class in 2022. Selected 1st Overall in the 2022 MLR Collegiate Draft by the Dallas Jackals out of UC Berkeley, Sam Golla has been exceptional since starting his pro rugby career. He started all 16 appearances for the Jackals during his rookie season, scoring 3 tries and gaining over 500m while completing a massive 218 tackles, averaging 13.6 tackles per game. Unsurprisingly, this earned him the 2023 MLR Rookie of the Year award, becoming the first 1st Overall Draft Pick to win the award. Following this superb first year of pro rugby, Golla earned his test debut for the USA as Eagle #558 against Romania in August 2023.
Golla represented the Jackals for two seasons between 2023-2024, scoring 6 tries in 26 games (25 starts) and completing well over 300 tackles before the team withdrew from the competition. Following this, the Texas born, Colorado raised Golla headed to North Carolina to join Anthem RC with former Jackals head coach Agustin Cavalieri, where he’s played for the last two seasons. He added another strong defensive season in 2025 (187 tackles made in 15 games) and remains a constant in the Rising Stars lineup this season, appearing in all 9 games so far. In his 50 game MLR career so far, Golla has started 47 times and notched 8 tries on over 1,100m gained (impressive for a forward), and has completed a huge 584 tackles in total with over 100 in each of his last three seasons, but a slight drop this year (67 in 9 games). Golla follows Canadian Cali Martinez as the 2nd member of the 2022 MLR Draft Class to reach 50 appearances in the competition. Congratulations, Sam!
Before the 2026 season, only 4 players had ever reached 100 appearances in Major League Rugby. Despite being a shortened season this year, that number has doubled! Luke White, Riekert Hattingh, and Jake Turnbull have all joined MLR’s exclusive ‘100 club’ and in Round 10, they were joined by California Legion forward, Keni Nasoqeqe!
Born and raised in Fiji, Nasoqeqe grew up playing rugby for Lelean Memorial School in Nausori near the capital of Suva, before moving to the United States in 2015 and settling in California. He promptly joined Belmont Shore RFC in Long Beach, helping them to a Pacific Rugby Premiership title in 2018, before turning professional and joining the San Diego Legion ahead of the 2019 MLR season. Nasoqeqe started 12 of his 13 games for the Legion that season, scoring 2 tries and completing 138 tackles (still his career high) to help the team finish as MLR Runners-Up that season. He would represent the San Diego Legion for 3 seasons between 2019-2021, starting 22 of his 28 appearances and scoring 5 tries in total with over 1,000m gained in possession.
Ahead of the 2022 MLR season, Keni Nasoqeqe moved from the west coast to Texas, joining the Houston SaberCats. After struggling through the first few years in the competition, the SaberCats went through a period of rebuild ahead of the 2022 season, bringing in former Springboks head coach Heyneke Meyer and veteran South African coach Pote Human to take the reigns. This transformation wasn’t limited to the front office, with plenty of new players arriving from around the league and beyond, including Keni Nasoqeqe. It was with the Houston SaberCats that he earned the bulk of his 100 appearances in MLR. Nasoqeqe played with Houston for 4 seasons between 2022-2025, posting positive records and qualifying for the post-season every year. In total, Nasoqeqe earned 63 appearances for the SaberCats, appearing in 17 games in 3 different seasons including 2025, when the SaberCats posted an impressive 14-2 record and advanced to the MLR Championship Game where they fell to the New England Free Jacks.
With the unexpected withdrawal of the SaberCats from MLR following the 2025 season, Keni Nasoqeqe returned to California to rejoin the new look California Legion. He’s started 5 of his 9 games for the Legion so far this season to reach triple figures! In terms of career totals, Nasoqeqe has started 59 of his 100 appearances including a high of 14 for Houston in 2022, scoring 10 tries in total. He sits just shy of 700 tackles made and has over 1,850m gained in possession. Congratulations on your 100th appearances, Keni!
Carty sets single season record!
With 6pts for Anthem RC from 3 successful conversions in the Rising Stars defeat to the California Legion at the weekend, Irish born USA Eagle Luke Carty moves to 53pts on the season, setting a new Anthem single season record for points in a season! Carty is just the second Anthem player ever to score over 50pts in a season, and overtakes Cliven Loubser’s 51pts in 2024 to set the new benchmark. Loubser is currently Anthem RC’s all-time top scorer with 57pts scored for the team, but Carty now sits just 4pts behind him with 1 regular season game left this season. Can he take the top spot?
Scoring points is nothing new for Luke Carty. He passed 250pts scored earlier this season and currently sits as MLR’s 12th highest scorer with 279pts scored in 64 games, putting him 4th among active players. This season, Carty is 25/34 from the tee across his 8 games played for a success rate of 73.53%, far higher than his career average of 68.82% (117/170). He has only scored 1 MLR try so far, which came back in 2024 while playing for the Chicago Hounds.
Scoring Stats
On the subject of scoring points, Luke Carty wasn’t the only player with a standout scoring stat in Round 10. In Seattle, a gutsy win over the Free Jacks was secured by a Divan Rossouw score that took the Seawolves just out of reach for the defending champions, securing a playoff berth for the 4x finalists and keeping their hunt for a home playoff game alive.
This was the 17th MLR try for capped Namibian international Rossouw which, when added to his 3 penalties and 3 conversions he scored while filling in as Seattle Seawolves place kicker during their injury ravaged start to 2026, takes his points total over the 100pt mark, to 102! Rossouw is averaging 0.4 tries per game across his 44 appearances for Seattle, and is the 7th player in Seawolves history to pass 100pts scored for the team. Congratulations, Divan!
Moving down the west coast from Seattle to California and the Legion, who were in fact playing Anthem all the way across the country in North Carolina. The Legion secured their spot in the 2026 playoffs in style, with an eight-try, 26-55 victory over the Rising Stars. Three of these scores came from USA eligible Welshman Steff Crimp, recording the first hat trick of his MLR career and doubling his career try total from 3 to 6!
Now on a career high 4 tries in 7 games (4 starts) so far this season, Crimp’s hatty is the first in California Legion history, and only the second hat trick of the 2026 season after Brock Webster for the Chicago Hounds in Round 5. This is the 55th hat trick in Major League Rugby history! Congratulations, Steff!
Player Milestones
The Seattle Seawolves completed the season sweep of the defending champion New England Free Jacks over the weekend, retaining the Coffee Cup with a surprisingly dominant victory (although the scoreline suggests otherwise thanks to a late surge from the Free Jacks). In this game, winger Ina Futi recorded the 2nd highest metres gained total for the Seawolves, with 55m gained which isn’t particularly remarkable in and of itself, however this pushes his career total over the 4,000m mark, becoming just the 16th player in MLR history to pass 4km made in possession!
A gridiron football player in his native American Samoa, Ina Futi moved to California in 2014 before moving to Idaho the following year and picking up rugby, before heading to Seattle in 2018 and joining Seattle RFC. The rugby club has served as a regular feeder team (and pre-season opponent) for the Seattle Seawolves over the years, and after excelling with the club, Futi was signed to a MLR deal ahead of the 2021 season and has represented the Seawolves ever since. His breakout season came in 2023 when he finished 2nd league-wide for metres gained with an extraordinary 1,495, scoring 9 tries and even completing 89 tackles out on the wing. These all remain career highs for Futi.
Averaging 57.8m gained per match across his 70 game MLR career so far, Futi is entering rarified air at the top of the Metre Eater leaderboard. He is currently sat 15th all-time for metres gained, while passing 4,500m would put him in the Top 8, alongside teammates Duncan Matthews and Riekert, who are both approaching metre milestones of their own, so watch this space. Congratulations, Ina!
Moving from metres gained to tackles made, and from the Seawolves to their Round 10 opponents, the New England Free Jacks. After signing with the Free Jacks from Old Glory DC in a high-profile move during the off-season, capped USA Eagle Jama Fa’anana-Schultz headed to France to join RC Narbonnais in the 3rd tier, Nationale. Narbonne qualified for the playoffs and eventually claimed the Nationale title and with it, promotion to the Pro D2. Excellent for Fa’anana-Schultz, although Narbonne’s success actually kept ‘JFS’ away from the Free Jacks for much of the season, finally linking up with the reigning champs and earning his Free Jacks debut in Round 9, and earning his first start this weekend in Round 10.
The long time Old Glory DC player and former Captain completed a team-high 17 tackles in round 10 to take his total to an even 700 tackles completed in his 72 game MLR career so far, averaging just under 10 tackles per game! Fa’anana-Schulz began his career with the Houston SaberCats in 2019 before joining DC for their inaugural season and playing with the Flags from 2020-2025, when he joined New England. Along with his 700 tackles that includes a high of 187 back in 2023, JFS has scored 16 tries on over 3,300m gained, setting his carer high of 4 tries in his final season in DC. Congratulations, Jama!
Not to take any of the shine off of Fa’anana-Schultz’s achievement, but he was not the only Free Jack to pass a big tackle milestone in this game. Captain Joe Johnston recorded slightly fewer tackles than JFS in this game at 14 (Johnston and Fa’anana-Schultz combined for just over 20% of all tackles made by the Free Jacks in this game!), but this took ‘The Mechanic’ career total over NINE HUNDRED, putting him in the Top 13 MLR tackles ever!
Johnston now sits at 901 tackles made in his 73 MLR games (60 starts) in total, all for the Free Jacks. The 3x Shield Winner is averaging 12.3 tackles across his career, but that season his average is an insane 16.8 tackles per game, passing 100 tackles in just his 6th game of the season. Congratulations, Joe!
Scorigami Check
Sticking with a newer segment that applies the concept of ‘Scorigami’ to Major League Rugby. ‘Scorigami’ is a method of tracking all final scores for a given league that originated in the NFL but has since grown in popularity and spread to other sports and leagues, with a ‘Scorigami’ being a score that has never occurred before. NARDB has applied the same method to MLR but does not take credit for starting this, as it has been present on the r/MLRugby subreddit for years.
The table below breaks down the three results from Round 10 of the 2026 Major League Rugby season, including how many times each score has occurred in the past and when, or if the final score is a MLR Scorigami that has never occurred before!
 36 – 28  |  26 – 55  |  32 – 33  |
|---|---|---|
| 4th Occurrence | 2nd Occurrence | 2nd Occurrence |
 36 – 28  2025 – Rd 4 |  55 – 26  2018 – Rd 5 | 32 – 33  2024 – Rd 8 |
 36 – 28  2023 – Rd 18 | ||
 36 – 28 2022 – Rd 13 |
Wrapping Up
For once, the Chicago Hounds didn’t break a crazy record! Instead, this week’s Midweek Milestones article covered appearance achievements for an MLR Draftee and a new Centurion, a new single season scoring record for the Rising Stars among other scoring achievements, and a bunch of player milestones for both tackles and metres gained! Three big games every week this year is throwing up a huge number of standout stats for us to break down, and I hope you enjoy them. Come back next week for all the juicy numbers from the final week of the 2026 Regular Season!
Thank you for reading this week’s edition of Midweek Milestones! Please feel free to let me know what you thought of this article (and the new addition of the Scorigami Summary) on social media, or let me know if you’ve found any standout stats that weren’t mentioned here!
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