South African centre Tiaan Loots played in Major League Rugby between 2020-2025. He represented the Houston SaberCats for his debut season in North America, before moving to the San Diego Legion (2021-2025).

Loots’ original move to MLR was announced in August 2019, when the Houston SaberCats announced his signing from the Newport Gwent Dragons (now just Dragons RFC) in the Pro14 (now URC) competition. Loots appeared in (and started) 4 of the 5 SaberCats games in 2020 before the season was cancelled due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, finishing 6th in Meters Gained at the point the season was cancelled.

The San Diego Legion announced the signing of Loots in April 2021 for the remainder of that year’s season, which had started a few weeks prior. He earned 8 caps (all starts) and scored 3 tries in his first season with the Legion and has represented them in every season since, amassing 27 caps with them (31 total) and scoring 7 tries (8 total), 4 of which came in 5 games (3 starts) during the Legion’s record breaking 2023 season where they went all the way to the Championship Final before falling 24-25 to the New England Free Jacks in Chicago. Loots earned a personal best of 3 Team of the Week selections in 5 games in 2023.

On 10th October 2023, the Legion announced the return of Tiaan Loots along with 3 other members of their 2023 roster for the 2024 MLR season. Loots scored a career high 6 tries in 10 games (9 starts) in 2024 and gained over 800m in possession. The Legion qualified 3rd in the West but fell to rivals the Seattle Seawolves in the Western Conference Semifinal. Loots was named to the All-MLR Second XV for his performance in 2024.

Achievements

• 2024 All-MLR Second XV
• MLR Team of the Week: 2024 – Rd 17
• MLR Team of the Week: 2024 – Rd 13
• MLR Team of the Week: 2024 – Rd 4
• 2023 MLR Runner-Up: San Diego Legion
• MLR Team of the Week: 2023 – Rd 17
• MLR Team of the Week: 2023 – Rd 13
• MLR Team of the Week: 2023 – Rd 10
• MLR Team of the Week: 2022 – Rd 13
• MLR Team of the Week: 2022 – Rd 1
• MLR Team of the Week: 2021 – Rd 12
• MLR Team of the Week: 2021 – Rd 11
• 6th League-Wide for Meters Gained: 2020 (370)
• MLR Team of the Week: 2020 – Rd 3