Tag: Houston SaberCats

Midweek Milestones: Standout Stats from Round 17 of MLR2025!

NARDatabase

James Deeley

17 weeks of Major League Rugby action have been and gone, and in what seems like the blink of an eye, the 2025 Regular Season is at an end. For three teams, their season is over and the off-season awaits full of planning for the MLR Draft in August, and the 2026 season. For four teams from each Conference, it’s crunch time. The Playoffs await!

Welcome back to Midweek Milestones, NARDB’s weekly article that highlights and examines the standout stats from each round of MLR action! Just because the regular season ends with Round 17 that doesn’t mean there wasn’t still plenty to talk about. These articles aim to recognise achievements by players and/or teams that may have gone unnoticed or flown under the radar otherwise, providing fans with some extra insight and context every week to add an extra level to MLR! As always, Appearance Achievements are up first!

Appearance Achievements

The final round of the season often brings interesting lineups. Teams that are already securely in the playoffs with no chance of securing home advantage and only a narrow chance of moving positions sometimes reward depth players that have worked hard in camp all season. This gives teams a chance to see what their prospects can do at professional match level, and also exposes the players to valuable high-level game time. With the season staying so competitive right up until the final whistle of the final game, there were only a couple of unusual lineups, including a few MLR debuts!

The Miami Sharks secured their first ever Playoff berth last week, qualifying for the postseason in just their 2nd season. They were almost destined to face off against the defending champion New England Free Jacks as the 4th seed and decided to rest the majority of their starters this week. In fact, only Santiago Videla remained in their starting lineup from last week as Chase Schor-Haskin scored his first MLR try on his first MLR start, Isaac Bales came off the bench for his Sharks debut and first MLR appearance since 2023, and two players earned their MLR debuts!

Starting on the wing for the Sharks was 2024 Draftee Jake Negrete. The St. Mary’s College alum was selected in the 2nd Round, 20th overall by the Houston SaberCats in 2024, before moving to the Sharks back in May. Although the details of the move haven’t been disclosed, Negrete finally made his MLR debut in a 42-17 defeat to the Seattle Seawolves in the Fish Bowl. Congratulations, Jake! Unfortunately, his debut lasted only a few minutes before he had to leave the pitch, so wishing him a safe and speedy recovery! Also earning his first MLR appearance was Blake Pereda, a new signing announced by the Sharks during the week. NARDB is unclear if this deal was signed prior to the 2025 signing deadline in May, or if Pereda is injury cover but regardless, the Miami Tridents player came off the bench for the final 35 minutes of action. Congratulations, Blake, and welcome to MLR!

Source: @utwarriorsrugby via Instagram

As two players earned their MLR debuts for the Sharks in the East, in the West a Utah Warrior joined the half-century club. Since joining the Utah Warriors ahead of the 2022 season, US-eligible New Zealand scrumhalf Zion Going has scored 8 tries and started 29 of his now 50 MLR appearances, and is enjoying a stand-out season in 2025! Going appeared in all 16 of the Warriors’ regular season games this year (a career high), starting a career high 13 times and scoring 4 tries, completing 85 tackles, and gaining 266m, all three are new career highs. Congratulations, Zion! It seems apt to wrap up Going’s career year by celebrating his 50th MLR appearance but with the Warriors finishing top of the league, could he also celebrate it with a Shield? We’ll have to wait and see…

Hounds Hit Half-Century!

In the same round that Zion Going earns his 50th MLR appearance for the Utah Warriors, the Chicago Hounds celebrate their 50th game played in Major League Rugby! The Eastern Conference Hounds secured a hard fought 15-12 victory over the Houston SaberCats in the Dogs v Cats match to clinch their first ever home playoff game, in their 50th MLR match!

Since joining in 2023, the Hounds have an all-time regular season record of 22-1-25 as well as an even record of 1-1 in the postseason thanks to their Conference Final run in 2024. With 4pts in their nail-biting win over the SaberCats, the Hounds also draw to within 1pt of the LA Giltinis in the all-time MLR standings. Congratulations, Chicago!

Source: @Chicagohoundsrugby via Instagram

Playoff Placement

As mentioned off the top, Major League Rugby’s 11 teams has been whittled down to 8 that advance to the 2025 postseason. This section will take a look at the playoff histories for each team, and some standout stats around the postseason.

In the Eastern Conference, the defending champion New England Free Jacks claim the top spot for the FOURTH year in a row to qualify for the post season for the 4th time in succession. The back-to-back Champions had a shaky start to the year, but have recovered well and banked a 11-5 record in their bid for the threepeat! They will face a team that has been a bit of a boogeyman for them, the Miami Sharks. The 4th seeded Sharks are enjoying their playoff debut in 2025 after qualifying with a franchise-best 8-8 record with 41pts. The Sharks have defeated the Free Jacks twice in their short history, but never in Quincy. Could we see an upset for the ages?
Over to the other matchup in the Eastern Conference, hosted by the 2nd seed Chicago Hounds at SeatGeek Stadium, as mentioned above. One of the Hounds’ key targets in 2025 was to host a playoff match and they hit that target with a strong 11-5 record. This matches the Free Jacks’ record and the Hounds took it to New England all year, in the end finishing only 2pts behind them due to a pair of extra Try BPs earned by the Free Jacks. Like the Sharks, this is by far the best regular season in Hounds history and the 2nd year in a row that they have qualified. Back in 2024, they routed the NOLA Gold on the road before falling to the Free Jacks in the Eastern Conference Final by the skin of their teeth. The Hounds want to at least match that, and are out for revenge. Standing in their way first however, are Old Glory DC. The Flags qualified with a matching record to the Sharks, 8-8, but finished with 4pts more thanks to their 4 additional bonus points. DC, like Chicago, are looking for revenge over the Free Jacks who have knocked them out in both of the last two seasons. Will 3rd time be the charm?

Now to the Western Conference which has produced the #1 team in the entire league for the 3rd year in a row. In 2025, the Utah Warriors finish as the Top team in MLR with the same 11-5 record as both New England and Chicago, but with 58pts in total. A franchise best season from the mountain men. The Warriors end MLR’s longest playoff drought and qualify for the postseason for the first time since 2021, where they will face the 4th seeded Seattle Seawolves, playing in their MLR-leading sixth postseason at the expense of their rivals, the San Diego Legion. 2024’s runners-up finish with a 8-7-1 record, just 1pt ahead of the Legion. Finally, last seasons top seed finishes 4pts behind Utah in 2nd with a 10-6 record. The Houston SaberCats clinched home advantage with a win in their last game of the season to qualify for the 3rd year on the trot, but are yet to record a playoff victory. The ‘Cats will face a run ‘n gun Rugby FC LA team, who finished 2pts ahead of Seattle with the same 8-7-1 record to earn their playoff debut in their 2nd season.

The 2025 Playoff picture at the end of the Regular Season

Wrapping Up

That does it for a ‘Playoff Prep’ edition of Midweek Milestones. A pair of MLR debuts, a team and a player join the half-century club, and a bumper overview of the 2025 playoff picture! The business end of the Major League Rugby season is here, with all four matchups looking to be thrillers. Midweek Milestones will continue through the postseason, so be sure to check back next week for all sorts of playoff stats!

Thank you for reading the final regular season edition of NARDB’s Midweek Milestones! This series will continue through the postseason, where we are bound to get plenty of standout stats! If you like this series, please get in touch on social media or share this article to help highlight these achievements! If there’s anything that has been missed that you feel is worth mentioning, you can reach out to NARDB via the ‘Contact’ tab on this site. Alternatively, you can reach out to NARDB or James on social media: @MLRStats on Instagram/Threads, @JamDelay & @NARugbyDB on Twitter/X, and @JamDelay & @NARDB on Bluesky! NARDB can also be found on YouTube, at NARStats!

Finally, If you’re looking to get your hands on some of the new Macron merch for 2025 or to add to your jersey collection, visit shopmlr.com to get your hands on all that new gear, and remember to use code ‘MLRSTATS’ at checkout for 15% off your order!

Midweek Milestones: Standout Stats from Round 16 of MLR2025!

NARDatabase

James Deeley

Round 16 of the 2025 Major League Rugby season has been and gone, and just like that there is only 1 round of regular season action remaining! Four more teams secured their places in the 2025 post-season over the weekend with just 1 spot still up for grabs, being fought over by MLR’s oldest rivals, the Seattle Seawolves and San Diego Legion.

Welcome back to Midweek Milestones, NARDB’s weekly article that highlights and examines the standout stats from each round of MLR action! This week’s article covers the penultimate round of MLR regular season action: Round 16. These articles aim to recognise achievements by players and/or teams that may have gone unnoticed or flown under the radar otherwise, providing fans with some extra insight and context every week to add an extra level to MLR! As always, Appearance Achievements are up first!

Appearance Achievements

Round 16 saw a pair of test capped players feature in their 50th MLR match. One has represented the USA Eagles on the international stage, the other has represented Canada. Both have had remarkable impacts on MLR history, and we will start with California native Christian Dyer!

A native of Sacramento, CA and UCal – Berkeley alum, Christian Dyer‘s MLR career got off to a shaky start. He was initially signed with the Dallas Jackals for their inaugural season in 2021. After Dallas deferred their entry to 2022, Dyer was selected by Rugby New York in the supplementary draft but didn’t join the Ironworkers for the 2021 season. In January of 2022 the Houston SaberCats announced that they had signed Dyer for the 2022 season, and his pro career finally got started despite already having earned his test debut as USA Eagle #539 against England in July 2021. Dyer earned 45 appearances for the SaberCats between 2022-2024, starting 44 times including in the team’s first ever playoff game in 2022. He gained just over 1,750m as a ‘Cat including a career high of 719m in 2023 when he scored 9 tries, also a career high. Dyer remains the Houston SaberCats’ all-time leading try scorer with 19 in black and gold, and has been capped 14 times by his country. Dyer was the first player announced by Rugby FC LA ahead of the 2025 season, and has scored an additional 2 tries in 5 games (4 starts) in California, helping the team to it’s first ever postseason appearance. Congratulations, Christian!

Source: @Rugbyfcla via Instagram

Joining Christian Dyer in the half-century club after Round 16 is South African born Edmontonian Dewald Kotze! The test-capped Canadian hooker moved from South Africa to Edmonton, AB at the age of 14, joining the Strathcona Druids before moving to the Canadian National Team development program, the Pacific Pride in 2019. Kotze was named in a 40-man extended Canada squad in June 2021, but would have to wait until 2024 before earning his test debut for his adopted country, a 35-22 victory over Romania in Ottawa. At club level, Dewald Kotze was signed by the Dallas Jackals in January 2022, representing the Texas team for 3 seasons between until their untimely demise in 2024. Kotze earned 36 appearances for the Jackals in that time, starting 29 times and scoring 14 tries including a career high of 11 in 2023 when he scored a MLR-record FIVE tries in a single game for the Jackals against Seattle. The Seawolves clearly liked the look of Dewald Kotze, as they signed him for the 2025 season after the Jackals withdrew from MLR, and he has scored another 3 tries in 14 games (6 starts) in Seattle. Kotze now has 17 tries total and has started 35 of his 50 MLR matches to date, and reached 100 tackles on the season during Round 16, his 3rd 100+ tackle season in a row. Congratulations, Dewy!

Playoff Placements!

As mentioned in the intro, another 4 teams clinched their spot in the postseason during Round 16. three Western Conference teams have secured their spots, and the final spot in the East has been locked up. This section will dive a little deeper into the 2025 playoff placements.

Starting with that final spot in the Eastern Conference. The Miami Sharks pulled off what many fans would’ve thought impossible at the start of the season. They took on the reeling San Diego Legion at Torero Stadium, and came out on top. Although they didn’t secure a try BP, a superb performance from Shane O’Leary (more on that later!) ensured they took 4pts in a 32-36 victory to secure their first ever postseason appearance in just their 2nd season in MLR! The Sharks are now destined to finish 3rd or 4th in the East, facing either the New England Free Jacks or Chicago Hounds on the road. This Sharks victory eliminates the NOLA Gold, who are playing for pride now and will be doing some serious head scratching after arguably their worst season to date. Miami have also made life very uncomfortable for the San Diego Legion, who now must win their final game to have any hope of leapfrogging the Seattle Seawolves and making the playoffs.

Source: @usmlr via Instagram

Moving over to that warzone that is the 2025 Western Conference. As mentioned above the Seattle Seawolves and San Diego Legion are still scrapping over that final playoff spot, but 3 of the 5 teams in the West all secured their spots over the weekend, including the Houston SaberCats who didn’t even have to play! The Legion’s home loss at the hands of the Miami Sharks means they can only get to 8 wins compared to Houston’s 9, handing a 4th postseason appearance in a row to the SaberCats. Although they have two games remaining and are still fighting for home field advantage, and don’t yet know who they will be facing, the ‘Cats no doubt have one eye on the playoffs already. In 3 postseason appearances since 2022, Houston are yet to record a playoff victory. Is the 4th time the charm?

Now onto the team currently sat atop the Western Conference, the Utah Warriors. They actually clinched a playoff spot a day before the Houston SaberCats thanks to a comfortable bonus point victory over Anthem RC at home. The Warriors are currently the top team in MLR with 10 wins and 53pts, but can still fall as low as 3rd due to how close the West is. Even a bonus point victory doesn’t secure 1st place just yet. Utah need Houston to drop points in their final two games to lock that top spot up. Utah face Rugby FC LA in their final game, who sit 2nd in the West on 50pts. A win their would guarantee a home semifinal for the Warriors, as either the 1st or 2nd seed.

Moving on to Rugby FC LA who, like the Sharks in the East, have secured their first ever postseason berth following a 32-43 bonus point road victory over Old Glory DC at the Maryland Soccerplex. Now sat 2nd in the Western Conference, RFCLA will need a bonus point win in their last match against the 1st placed Utah Warriors to give them the best chance of securing home advantage. There’s a ferocious 3-way fight between LA, Houston, and Utah for the top two spots, and fans will be in for a treat in Round 17!

Sensational Sharks!

The Miami Sharks’ superb road victory over the San Diego Legion has already been mentioned a number of times in this article, but now it is time to dive deeper into some of the standout stats from this playoff-clinching win! Miami’s talismanic flanker Manu Ardao notched one of 3 Sharks tries in this match to take take his season total to 5. This equals his total from last season and takes his career MLR total to 10, making him the first player in Sharks history to reach 10 tries scored for the team! Can he get a couple more before the end of the season?

The main story coming out of this game however, was the performance of Shane O’Leary. The Canada-capped Irishman was like clockwork off of the tee, scoring 3 conversions and 5 penalties for 21 of Miami’s 36pts in this game to help them secure their first ever playoff spot! With 60% of both the territory and possession in favour of the San Diego Legion, O’Leary‘s boot was the difference. The Legion only conceded 8 penalties all game but O’Leary and the Sharks kicked 6 of them, converting 5!

Shane O’Leary racks up 21pts from the boot!

Finishing the game with 8/9 from the tee, the former Toronto Arrows fly-half set a new Miami Sharks record for points in a single game, as well as a 2025 high in that same category. His 21pts takes his season total to 90, surpassing Santiago Videla’s 74pts last season to set a new Miami Sharks single season record and climb to 1st place in the entire league for points scored this season! O’Leary’s career total now sits at 153pts including 101 for the Sharks, becoming just the 2nd player in Sharks history to pass 100pts scored for the team behind the aforementioned Santiago Videla. Congratulations, Shane!

Scoring Standouts – Hodgson & Hilsenbeck

On the subject of scoring milestones, following a comfortable 31-10 home victory over Anthem RC, Joel Hodgson has now achieved something that only 10 other players have done. With 2pts scored from a conversion kick, Hodgson’s total now sits at exactly 300pts scored becoming just the 11th player in MLR history to reach 300pts scored in the competition! He is the first Utah Warriors to reach 300pts scored, and the 8th player in MLR history to reach 300pts scored with a single MLR franchise. Hodgson now sits just 13pts back of MLR’s Top 10 Scorers ever, with Seattle Seawolves legend Brock Staller sat on 313pts in total. Congratulations, Joel!

Moving from Utah up to Chicago, where the Hounds are sitting just 2pts off the top of the Eastern Conference after a bonus point victory over the NOLA Gold took them into 2nd. 8 of Chicago’s 38pts came off the boot of US-eligible German international Chris Hilsenbeck, who went 4/6 from the tee. With a total of 84pts on the season, Hilsenbeck moves up to T-2nd in scoring, and sets a new Chicago Hounds franchise record for points in a season, surpassing the previous record of 77pts set by Adriaan Carelse in 2024. Congratulations, Chris!

Wrapping Up

That does it for the Midweek Milestones from Round 16 of the 2025 Major League Rugby Season! Four teams clinch playoff spots, a pair of new half-century club members, and some spectacular scoring achievements! The final week of the regular season is here already. What sorts of standout stats will it leave us with? You’ll have to check in next week’s Midweek Milestones article!

Thank you for reading this edition of NARDB’s Midweek Milestones! If you like this series, please get in touch on social media or share this article to help highlight these achievements! If there’s anything that has been missed that you feel is worth mentioning, you can reach out to NARDB via the ‘Contact’ tab on this site. Alternatively, you can reach out to NARDB or James on social media: @MLRStats on Instagram/Threads, @JamDelay & @NARugbyDB on Twitter/X, and @JamDelay & @NARDB on Bluesky! NARDB can also be found on YouTube, at NARStats!

Finally, If you’re looking to get your hands on some of the new Macron merch for 2025 or to add to your jersey collection, visit shopmlr.com to get your hands on all that new gear, and remember to use code ‘MLRSTATS’ at checkout for 15% off your order!

Midweek Milestones: Standout Stats from Round 13 of MLR2025!

NARDatabase

James Deeley

The business end of the 2025 Major League Rugby season is here, so much so that the first team has already been mathematically eliminated from playoff contention! Round 13 of the season is a strange one in that there was a game earlier this week on Monday night, but Round 14 started almost immediately after with a Tuesday night match up. It may have made more sense for the Tuesday night game to be included in Round 13 and Round 14 start on Friday, but there must have been a reason for it…

Welcome back to Midweek Milestones! The weekly article that explores and highlights all of the standout stats from the latest round of MLR action. This article will cover the entirety of Round 13, as well as the first game of Round 14. The purpose of this article series is to highlight some of the milestones or achievements from around the league that might not otherwise get the coverage or recognition they deserve. If you’re a fan of these articles, please go back and read the past editions (if you haven’t already!) and share them with your friends. As is tradition, first up are the appearance achievements!

Appearance Achievements

For the first time in a number of weeks, no players earned their Major League Rugby debuts during Round 13. This is likely because teams are getting the hang of their squad rotation as the midweek games continue to test the depth of every squad. The players earning debuts a few weeks ago are now entering their 2nd, 3rd, or 4th MLR game, giving them valuable exposure to top-level competition and letting coaches know what they’re capable of. However, just because there were no debutants this week doesn’t mean the Appearance Achievements section of Midweek Milestones is empty. Four players entered the half-century club in Round 13, all earning their 50th MLR appearances in the same game: the Western Conference clash between the San Diego Legion and Houston SaberCats.

Starting with the hosting San Diego Legion who had a pair of players celebrating their 50th MLR appearances, both of whom started their MLR careers in Austin with the Gilgronis. First up is Australian hooker Hugh Roach, who joined the AGs ahead of the 2021 MLR season. A former Australia U20 man, Roach started 19 of his 23 games with the Gilgronis from 2021 until their disqualification at the end of the 2022 regular season. He scored 14 tries in black & orange before moving to the Chicago Hounds following the 2022 dispersal draft. Roach scored another 3 tries in 6 games (5 starts) for the Hounds in their inaugural season, before heading to California and signing with the San Diego Legion for 2024. Since then, he’s scored 7 tries in 21 games (all starts) for the Legion, taking his MLR try total to 24. Hugh Roach has started 45 of his 50 MLR appearances since 2021, with just over 1,200m gained and 549 tackles completed including 4 seasons of 100+ tackles including 2025. Congratulations, Hugh!

Joining the 50-club alongside Hugh Roach is Eagle #503, Marcel Brache. Raised in South Africa, Brache represented the USA at the Rugby World Cup in Japan in 2019, before joining the Austin Gilgronis in 2022 from the Western Force. Brache recorded a career high 911m gained in his 13 games with the AGs in 2022, playing alongside Hugh Roach. He joined the San Diego Legion following the disqualification of the Gilgronis and has started 32 of his 37 games for the Legion in his 3 seasons there. Brache has started 44 of his 50 career MLR games, scoring 5 tries in total and running for 2,435m gained. Congratulations on your 50th MLR appearance, Marcel!

Moving over to the Legion’s opposition, the Houston SaberCats, who also celebrated a pair of 50th appearances! Starting in the front row with Pono Davis! The Hawaiian prop began his MLR career with the ‘Cats back in 2022, and has earned all 50 of his MLR appearances with Houston. A crossover athlete from the XFL, Davis played with the American Raptors before entering MLR and earned just the 1 start through his first 2 seasons and 23 games in MLR. Since then however, he has worked his way into the starting lineup more and more often, starting 4 of 17 games last year, and 9 of 10 in 2025 so far. To date, Pono Davis has started 14 of his 50 appearance for the SaberCats, completing 297 tackles but is yet to score a try. Perhaps 2025 is the year? Congratulations, Pono!

Source: @houstonsabercats via Instagram.

The final player joining the half-century club in Round 13, playing for the Houston SaberCats alongside Pono Davis for his entire MLR career to date is South African fly-half/fullback Davy Coetzer! Like Davis, Coetzer started his MLR career back in 2022, exploding onto the scene with 3 tries and 79pts scored in his debut season. Since then, Coetzer has scored another 15 tries to take his total to 18, along with an impressive 349pts scored in total for the SaberCats. Coetzer has started 49 of his 50 MLR appearances to date and is a 2-time All-MLR selection (2nd XV in 2023, Honourable Mention XV in 2024). He is currently MLR’s 8th highest scorer of all time, and the 4th highest among active players. Coetzer earns his 50th MLR appearance after missing a few weeks due to injury, but doesn’t look like he’s lost a step. Congratulations, Davy!

Joe Johnston: New England’s most Capped Player!

On Saturday Joe Johnston, the 2025 Captain of the New England Free Jacks, featured in his 59th match for the franchise, becoming the most capped player in team history! The New Zealand flanker has appeared in 67.82% of all Free Jacks MLR games ever played, starting 47 times and completing 733 tackles to date. Johnston scored his 10th try this weekend while donning New England’s 2025 City Edition jersey, celebrating the 400th birthday of the City of Quincy!

Joe Johnston becomes the most capped Free Jack!

What makes Joe Johnston’s achievement that much more impressive is that he wasn’t with the team for the 2024 season, instead completing his studies in his native New Zealand! Johnston overtook Free Jacks legend John Poland for sole possession of first place. Poland, who would be way out in front if not for injury, is now level with Club Captain Josh Larsen who earned his 58th Free Jacks appearance in the same game. Congratulations, Joe!

Damm Reaches Double-Figures with LA!

Rugby FC LA battled back into the win column to keep their playoff hopes alive, recording a 45-17 victory over Anthem RC. The score line doesn’t tell the true story of the game, as the USA’s rising stars had kept it close for the majority of the match. Anthem pulled the score back to 26-17 with 10 minutes to go, but 19pts in the final 7 minutes from three RFCLA scores including a pair from Captain Jason Damm gave the impression of a blowout.

Damm’s brace in this game took his career total to 19 tries in 59 games, including 10 in 26 games for Rugby FC LA. He becomes just the 3rd player in RFCLA team history (not including Rugby ATL) to score double-figure tries! A capped USA Eagle, Jason Damm joins another pair of internationally capped RFCLA players with double-figure try counts for the team: Canadian Andrew Coe and Fijian Semi Kunatani, both currently on 11 tries for LA. Congratulations, Jason!

Wet Conditions in NOLA make for a record-setting slugfest!

After rain delays forced kickoff back, Friday night’s NOLA Gold v Miami Sharks game finally got underway, but the wet conditions severely affected play and resulted in a close range, grinding affair with plenty of handling errors. The two teams combined for only 387m gained, a total that has been regular eclipsed by single team totals during this season, even though meters total are generally lower in 2025 than in previous years. The Miami Sharks recorded 219m made in their 19-25 road victory, which is the 4th lowest total ever and sets a new MLR record for the lowest ever winning meters gained total! The previous record was the 243m set by the San Diego Legion in Round 3 of the 2025 season.

The NOLA Gold & Miami Sharks set two of the lowest Meters Made totals of all time!

Although the Miami Sharks’ 219m gained is one of the lowest totals of all time, their opponents set an even lower total. The NOLA Gold amassed only 168m gained in this game, becoming the first team in MLR history to record under 200m in a game, and setting a new lowest ever MLR total! Although their 40.51% possession can’t have helped matters, the lion’s share of the blame for these low totals can be attributed to the miserable conditions. But it just goes to show, even the messy games can result in some standout stats!

It is worth re-iterating that meters gained totals are down across the board in MLR’s 2025 season. Four of the 5 lowest team totals ever have already been recorded this season, including both the lowest winning total, and lowest overall total. Even individual player totals are down. The top Meter Eater heading into Round 14 of the 2025 season is Utah’s Jordan Trainor on an even 800m made. That same total would put Trainor 3rd at the same stage of the 2024 season. There were 9 players over 700m gained at this point of the 2024 season, this year, there are only 5. Some of this may be due to MLR switching analytics partner from Mobii to Oval Insights but no matter the cause, meters are harder to come by this year!

No Negatives in the Western Conference

In what seems like a rarity in a two-conference, 11 team league, there are no teams in Major League Rugby’s Western Conference that have a negative points differential after Round 13! The Utah Warriors and Houston SaberCats are both on +68 points on the season in first and second, respectively, then come the San Diego Legion with a solid +24 in third. The 5th placed Seattle Seawolves actually have the 4th best points differential in the West with +11 and finally, 4th placed Rugby FC LA improve to a +/- of 0 following their victory over Anthem RC!

When adding this to the two teams in the Eastern Conference that have positive points differentials (the New England Free Jacks on a league-best +87, and the Chicago Hounds on +33), SEVEN of Major League Rugby’s 11 teams have a positive (or neutral) points difference! All 4 teams with negative points difference are in the Eastern Conference, including a struggling Anthem RC team on a painful -219. Is this the first time in MLR history where no team in a conference has a negative differential!?

Seattle Seawolves pass 200 First XV selections!

With an impressive road victory over the Western Conference leaders the Utah Warriors, the Seattle Seawolves kept their playoff hopes alive! The 2-time Champs earned three First XV selections in Round 13 as Malembe Mpofu and Lauina Futi earned Team of the Week nods for their efforts, along with Nick Boyer on his Seawolves debut! This took Seattle to 16 selections on the 2025 season (tied for 8th) but more importantly, took them over 200 First XV selections all-time!

The Seattle Seawolves pass 200 First XV selections (all-time)

Now on 201 First XV selections in their history, the Seattle Seawolves are just the 2nd team ever to pass the 200 mark behind their old rivals the San Diego Legion, currently on 209. Unsurprisingly, the Top 5 consists entirely of MLR founding members as these teams have played the most games. The Utah Warriors sit 3rd way back on 164, ahead of the NOLA Gold on 159 and the Houston SaberCats on 148. It will be some time before a 3rd team passes the 200 mark, likely not until 2027. Congratulations, Seawolves!

Wrapping Up

That does it for the Midweek Milestones from a busy Round 13 in Major League Rugby! Four new members of the 50-cap club, some new all-time lows, and everyone is keeping positive in the Western Conference! With Round 14 having already kicked off on Tuesday night, what other standout stats will it treat us to over the weekend? You’ll have to wait and see in next week’s edition of Midweek Milestones!

Thank you for reading this edition of NARDB’s Midweek Milestones article! If you like this series, please get in touch on social media or share this article to help highlight these achievements! If there’s anything that has been missed that you feel is worth mentioning, you can reach out to NARDB via the ‘Contact’ tab on this site. Alternatively, you can reach out to NARDB or James on social media: @MLRStats on Instagram/Threads, @JamDelay & @NARugbyDB on Twitter/X, and @JamDelay & @NARDB on Bluesky! NARDB can also be found on YouTube, at NARStats!

Finally, If you’re looking to get your hands on some of the new Macron merch for 2025 or to add to your jersey collection, visit shopmlr.com to get your hands on all that new gear, and remember to use code ‘MLRSTATS’ at checkout for 15% off your order!


Midweek Milestones: Standout Stats from Round 11 of MLR2025!

NARDatabase

James Deeley

Round 11 of the 2025 season saw a bumper seven games during Major League Rugby’s first ever ‘Storm Week, including games on both Tuesday and Wednesday nights, and a number of teams playing two games in 1 round! With so many games, it’s hardly surprising that we saw some standout stats across the league for both teams and players, as well as some incredible appearance achievements!

Welcome back to Midweek Milestones, the weekly article that keeps fans informed of all the standout stats from the latest round of MLR action! The purpose of this article series is to highlight some of the milestones or achievements from around the league that might not otherwise get the coverage they deserve by the league itself. If you’re a fan of these articles, please go back and read the past editions (if you haven’t already!) and share them with your friends. As with last week, we begin with the appearance achievements

Appearance Achievements – Utah’s First Centurion!

On Saturday, Utah Warriors prop Angus MacLellan was in the starting XV for his 100th MLR game, becoming just the 3rd player in league history to feature in 100 matches! The Michigan native is the 2nd player to reach 100 games played with a single team after JP Smith for the Seattle Seawolves just last week. Although all 3 MLR Centurions (Dylan Fawsitt, JP Smith, and now Angus MacLellan) having represented the United States at test level as USA Eagles, MacLellan is the first US-born player to enter MLR’s ‘100 club’!

Angus MacLellan becomes the first US-Born player to reach 100 MLR Appearances

Major League Rugby

SeasonTeamGPGSTCPACDGMGTacklesKS/KAPts
MLR 2018Warriors99100003156105
MLR 2019Warriors16162000024396010
MLR 2020Warriors55000001083200
MLR 2021Warriors1713000003329200
MLR 2022Warriors155000002057600
MLR 2023Warriors164000002117200
MLR 2024Warriors146000001347500
MLR 2025Warriors14100000277900
Total-10659300001575583015

The Traverse City, MI man has spent his entire MLR career with the Utah Warriors, earning his debut in the league’s inaugural season in 2018 where he started all 9 games for the Warriors, including their lone playoff appearance that year. MacLellan started all of his 30 games for Utah between 2018-2020 and has racked up 59 starts in 100 games in his MLR career to date. Congratulations, Angus! His full career stats in MLR can be seen above.

MacLellan’s impressive accomplishment was not the only appearance milestone during a bumper Rd 11 of MLR action. Another member of the front row earned his 50th MLR appearance in a convincing victory over Anthem RC on Sunday, Miami Sharks prop Alec McDonnell! The Missouri native and Lindenwood alum made his MLR debut with New York back in 2020, but really broke into the league with the SaberCats in 2022, starting 8 of his 9 games for Houston that year. He followed this with 16 appearances and a career high 56 tackles in 2023 before moving from Houston to Miami and signing with the Sharks. McDonnell has earned 24 appearances with the Sharks since, and set a career high 101m gained in their inaugural season in 2024. To date, McDonnell has started 18 of his 50 appearances in the league, and passed 200 career tackles on his 50th cap, congratulations, Alec!

Source: @Miasharksrugby via Instagram

From a 100th appearance to a 50th, and now from a 50th appearance to a bunch of debutants. MLR’s first ever ‘Storm Week’ saw some teams play 2 games within 4 days of each other and as such, squad rotation came into play. Some fringe players that might not have had the chance came in to bolster lineups and as a result, FIVE players earned their MLR debuts in Round 11, with three of them for Anthem RC! Starting in their first game of Round 11, when a trio of front rowers earned their first MLR appearances. Recently acquired on loan from the Chicago Hounds, Indiana native Alexander Hernandez appeared in both of Anthem’s Round 11 matches, coming off the bench in both games! Hernandez was drafted 34th overall in 2024 by the Chicago Hounds out of Marian University, and impressed with the Hounds academy during their fall season, earning an MLR contract. He was loaned to Anthem where he had a better opportunity at earning game time, and that was proved correct. Congratulations, Alexander!

Born in the US but raised in Canada, Neil Trainor was selected 2nd overall in the 2024 MLR Draft by Anthem RC out of Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada. The Pacific Pride hooker earned just under 30 minutes of game time for Anthem in a tough 19-60 midweek affair last Wednesday, completing 4 tackles. In that same game, Californian prop Quinton Tindel also earned his MLR debut, coming on for the final 8 minutes and completing 2 tackles. Tindel, an alum of Cal Poly – San Luis Obispo and two-time Collegiate All-American, signed with Anthem RC as a free agent on a Homegrown Player Contract, and has now earned his Pro debut. Congratulations, both Neil and Quinton!

Moving away from Anthem RC and to one of their opponents from Round 11, the Miami Sharks. We have already discussed Alec McDonnell’s 50th MLR appearance, but packing down just behind him in the Sharks second row for the final few minutes of the match was Calvin Ihrig. The Chicago-born Lindenwood University alum discovered rugby which at school in Thailand, and was selected 3rd overall by the Sharks in the 2024 draft, now earning his debut off the bench in a comfortable 31-5 home victory. Congratulations, Calvin! Finally for the MLR debutants from Round 11, we head to the nation’s capital where Irish utility back Declan O’Loughlin made his Pro Debut for Old Glory DC in the final 10 minutes after earning his first pro contract during the DC academy season in the fall. A native of County Galway in Ireland, O’Loughlin made 7m and won a turnover as the Flags fell to the SaberCats in the Houston heat. Congratulations, Declan!

Victory Milestones

As mentioned just above, on Saturday the Houston SaberCats were able to hold of Old Glory DC for a comfortable victory at home, securing their second win in a row and staying atop the ferocious Western Conference. The SaberCats’ 48-27 victory over the Flags marks their 50th victory in MLR dating back to the league’s inaugural season in 2018, and claimed their 50th Try Bonus Point to boot! They hold an all-time regular season record of 50-0-53, and are 0-3 in the postseason. This makes them only the 4th team in MLR history to reach a half-century of victories in the competition. Congrats, ‘Cats!

The Houston SaberCats were not the only team to reach this marker during Round 11, however. The following day, the NOLA Gold recorded a big win over the Seattle Seawolves to claim their 50th MLR win, becoming the 5th team to reach the half-century of victories! The Gold have an all-time regular season record of 50-1-52 and are 0-1 in the postseason. In MLR’s All-Time Regular Season Standings, the Gold (274pts) sit just 9pts ahead of the SaberCats (265pts), both with 103 regular season games played.

Individual Scoring Milestones

Moving from team milestones to player achievements, starting with Tomas Aoake in San Diego. The Legion managed to snap their 4 game losing streak and retain the Cali Cup thanks in part to an Aoake score against Rugby FC LA over the weekend. This the 23rd try of Aoake’s MLR career, with all 23 having been scored for the Legion. The New Zealander’s 23rd tally and 5th of the 2025 season takes him ahead of team legend Nate Augspurger to become the San Diego Legion’s All-Time Top Try Scorer!

Although he had 4 tries in his debut MLR season in 2022, Aoake exploded in the Legion’s record-setting 2023 season, dotting down 11 times and running for 1,160m gained as San Diego finished as runners-up. These are still both career highs for Aoake. With 5 tries this year already to take him to T-12th all-time, how high can he get in 2025? Congratulations, Tomas!

Tomas Aoake becomes San Diego’s All-Time leading Try Scorer!

Moving from California over to the East Coast, the Miami Sharks’ dominant 31-5 victory over Anthem RC secured their 3rd victory in a row, setting a longest-ever win streak for the franchise! This victory was helped by the return of their talismanic Chilean international, Santiago Videla. As well as racking up just under 100m in meters made, Videla slotted 3 conversions and a penalty from the tee for 9pts in the game, taking his MLR total to 106. Scoring 100pts in Major League Rugby is an achievements in and of itself but with 106pts scored for the Sharks, Videla is the first player to pass 100pts scored for Miami! Congratulations, Santiago!

Heading to Texas, where the SaberCats recorded a runaway 48-27 victory over Old Glory DC, thanks in large part to a stellar performance from AJ Alatimu. The Samoan MLR veteran slotted 5 kicks from the tee (2pens, 3 cons) and added a try for 17pts in total from the man who sits 2nd All-Time in league scoring. This is the first time this season that a player has recorded over 15pts scored in a single game, setting a new 2025 record and surpassing the SEVEN players who have all scored 15pts in a game! With 6 weeks of action left in this regular season, will Alatimu’s season-high be beaten?

Alatimu sets new 2025 record with 17pt game for Houston

Miscellaneous Milestones!

Ending with a couple of tidbits from around the league that are worth mentioning and applauding, beginning with the Seattle Seawolves, who came close to a MLR record in their huge 19-60 road victory over Anthem RC in their first game of Round 11. The Seawolves ran riot in the Queen City, scoring 9 tries from 9 different players to equal the Toronto Arrows’ 9 different try scorers from a 31-64 victory over the Utah Warriors way back in 2019. This is T-2nd to only the Dallas Jackals, who scored 10 tries from 10 different scorers with a huge 28-68 road victory last season.

Now to a bit of history from the Chicago Hounds, who fielded their first pair of brothers in their clash with the Utah Warriors on Saturday. Mason Flesch started at lock while his younger brother Noah Flesch was at center for the match at Zion’s Bank Stadium and although they aren’t the first pair of brothers to start a MLR game together (The Suniula brothers come to mind for Seattle in the early years of the league, as well as the Kruse brothers for the Utah Warriors), they are the first pair of Canadian siblings to suit up together in a MLR starting 15. Congratulations to the Flesch brothers from Cobourg, Ontario!

Source: @chicagohoundsrugby via instagram

Wrapping Up

A bumper, 7-game Round 11 brought a bumper edition of Midweek Milestones this week, with all manner of appearance achievements, a new Legion try leader, 50th victories, and much more! With another midweek game to kick off Round 12, as well as a weekend full of MLR action, can we expect the same? You’ll have to check back in next week to find out!

Thank you for reading! If you like this series, please get in touch on social media and share this article to help highlight these achievements! If there’s anything that has been missed that you feel is worth mentioning, you can reach out to NARDB via the ‘Contact’ tab on this site. Alternatively, you can reach out to NARDB or James on social media: @MLRStats on Instagram/Threads, @JamDelay & @NARugbyDB on Twitter/X, and @JamDelay & @NARDB on Bluesky! NARDB also has a Youtube channel: NARStats!

Finally, If you’re looking to get your hands on some of the new Macron merch for 2025 or add to your jersey collection, visit shopmlr.com to get your hands on that new gear, and remember to use code ‘MLRSTATS’ at checkout for 15% off your order!

Midweek Milestones: Standout Stats from Round 9 of MLR2025!

NARDatabase

James Deeley

After Round 9, every team in Major League Rugby has played 8 games with the exception of the Seattle Seawolves and Utah Warriors, who have played 7. This means that the majority of teams have played half of their games in the 2025 regular season! Some, like the Chicago Hounds are flying high with a 7-1 record, while Anthem RC are still after that first victory at 0-8 and teams that started strong like the San Diego Legion are struggling. The mid-season comes quick! Lets dive into some of the standout stats from Round 9 of the 2025 MLR season.

Welcome back to Midweek Milestones, the weekly article that highlights the biggest milestones from around Major League Rugby, whether achieved by teams, players, or both. The purpose of these weekly articles is to highlight achievements (both big, and small) that may have gone under the radar in order to give them the attention they deserve, as well as to keep fans informed of some of the big milestones and the less publicized (but no less deserving) achievements around the League for each week! If you want to read previous Midweek Milestones articles, feel free to search ‘Midweek Milestones’, or click on the category just below the title of this article.

RFCLA’s new All-Time Top Scorer

After the demise of the LA Giltinis in 2022, Rugby FC LA is Major League Rugby’s second attempt at putting a team in the City of Angels. Relocated from Atlanta after a new ownership group purchased the Rugby ATL franchise, RFCLA played their first season in 2024, one of MLR’s most recent additions. The team is already developing quite a history, however. Building a fierce rivalry with California neighbors the San Diego Legion, and going toe to toe with the best in the Western Conference, RFCLA are definitely not to be taken lightly.

Christian Leali’ifano becomes RFCLA’s all-time top scorer

For their sophomore season in 2025, LA brought in big MLR names like Billy Meakes and Reece MacDonald, as well as superstars on the word stage like Argentina’s Gonzalo Bertranou, or dual-capped international Christian Leali’ifano, who has been like clockwork from the tee in the first half of this season. Leali’ifano has successfully kicked 25 of his 27 attempts from the tee and is one of only 3 players to have passed 50pts scored so far this season. His 56pts scored in just 7 games also makes him Rugby FC LA‘s all-time leading scorer, ahead of Semi Kunatani who has 54pts off of his 10 tries from last season (including two 7-pointers). Although it’s a young team, becoming the top scorer of a franchise is an impressive achievement, congratulations, Christian!

In the same game that Leali’ifano became RFCLA’s top scorer, Canadian speedster Andrew Coe moved into T-3rd on list, becoming just the 2nd player in team history to reach 10 tries scored with RFCLA behind the aforementioned Semi Kunatani! Coe’s 10th try for LA draws him level with Dan Hollinshead on 50pts and with Hollinshead having recently signed with the New England Free Jacks, Coe looks likely to move ahead of him this season. Congratulations, Andrew!

Team Milestones

Coming off of a few disappointing results in previous weeks, not many people gave the Miami Sharks much of a chance heading into the stronghold that is SaberCats Stadium to face Houston, and yet in this battle of land v sea, the Sharks upset the hosts to claim their first victory since Round 3! Their 31-22 victory lifts the Sharks over 500pts scored as a team, to 512 points scored as a franchise in MLR. Josiah Morra’s try on the stroke of half-time of his Miami Sharks debut (after being loaned there from the Free Jacks) was the score that lifted the Sharks over 500pts. Congratulations, Miami!

Staying in the Eastern Conference, the Sharks weren’t the only team to hit a milestone during Round 9. Heading up to Chicago, where the Hounds held off a spirited Anthem RC side for a 28-20 victory, their 7th win of the season and 19th as a team! With a bonus point victory, this takes the Hounds over 100pts in NARDB’s All-Time MLR Standings, but there’s a big caveat: playoff games are knockout and do not award any points. For the purposes of NARDB’s All-Time Standings, playoff games are included and award points as though they were regular season games.

Using this format, the Chicago Hounds have earned 6pts from playoff games, and 97 from regular season games. It’s a bit convoluted, but there is some value in having an all-time standings table that includes every MLR game ever played. The All-Time Standings page contains a table for every MLR game ever played, as well as all regular season games and all playoff games as separate tables.

Gold Rack Up a Half-Century in New Orleans!

The 2025 season has not began as well as the NOLA Gold would have hoped, managing just 1 win through their first 6 games. However, they have since rattled off two victories in quick succession including a statement 51-29 win over Eastern Conference rivals Old Glory DC in front of a home crowd while wearing their very sharp black city edition jerseys. With 7 tries and 51 points scored this ties a NOLA Gold Franchise record set in Round 2 of the 2021 season for points scored in a match, after a 51-28 victory over Rugby United New York on March 27th, 2021, almost an identical score! This is the first time that the Gold have scored over 50pts in a game since Round 15 of the 2022 season when they secured a 50-21 victory on May 14th, 2022, also against Old Glory DC.

NOLA Gold tie Franchise record for points scored, pass 2,500pts all-time

There’s plenty more to celebrate if you’re a NOLA Gold fan, though. By scoring 4+ tries in Round 9, the Gold secured a much needed try bonus point, which is the 50th Try BP that they have earned in their history! NOLA become the 3rd team to reach 50 Try BPs in MLR (4th if you include the playoffs, but they don’t award table points) behind the San Diego Legion (56) and the Utah Warriors (52). The Gold’s 51pts also takes the team over the 2,500pts scored milestone, becoming just the 5th team to pass 2.5k points scored as a franchise! They now sit on 2,547, with Jonah Mau’s early try in the 2nd minute carrying the Gold over the 2,500 mark.

And there’s even more to celebrate for the Gold! In the same game, Xavier Mignot picked up his 4th, 5th, AND 6th tries of the 2025 season to record his first MLR hat trick, and the 6th hat trick by a NOLA Gold player! He is the 46th MLR player to record a hat trick in the competition, claiming MLR’s 51st hat trick. Congratulations, Xavier!

Appearance Achievements

As usual, there were a number of landmark appearances in Round 9 comprised of a pair of MLR debuts, and another five players all earning their 50th appearance! The two debutants both earned their first MLR appearance in the same game, one for either side of a Western Conference clash between Rugby FC LA and the Utah Warriors. Making his debut first was US-Eligible New Zealander Cole Semu, who came on for the Utah Warriors in the 71st minute and made 3 tackles to help secure the win for the Warriors. Semu was drafted 28th overall by the Warriors out of BYU in the 2024 draft, and he has already played with the USA U18, U20, and U23 sides. Coming on in the final minute of the match for Rugby FC LA was US-born Australian dual-codes player Robert Mapa. The former Brothers Rugby man was included in the LA matchday 23 once already in 2025, but didn’t see action until Round 9 when he made 3m and completed a tackle in his roughly 1 minute of game time. Both young players are now blooded in Major League Rugby, will we see them again soon?

Moving over to the cross-conference clash between the Miami Sharks and the Houston SaberCats in Florida where one player from either side celebrated reaching a half-century of Major League Rugby appearances! For the hosting Miami Sharks, Irish born back rower Ronan Foley played his 50th game, earning his 5th start in as many games for the Sharks after joining the Florida team this season following the demise of the Dallas Jackals. Along with Miami this year and Dallas in 2024, Foley has represented the Seattle Seawolves (2023 – 3 tries in 11 games, 8 starts) and the Toronto Arrows (2021-2022 – 3 tries in 19 games, 16 starts), where he had a standout 2022 season. He racked up over 1,000m gained as a forward and completed 184 tackles, both remain career highs. Foley earned a Team of the Week selection on his 50th MLR cap for his performance in Miami’s surprise victory over Houston. Speaking of the SaberCats, despite the defeat they were able to celebrate the 50th MLR appearance of South African lock Justin Basson, who has started 41 of his 50 MLR games between Rugby ATL (2022-2023) Houston (2024-), scoring 7 tries and averaging 144 tackles per season. Congratulations to both Ronan and Justin!

Source: @HoustonSaberCats via Instagram

Staying in the South but travelling to New Orleans and the Gold Mine, which saw another three players celebrate their 50th Major League Rugby appearance, beginning with the hosting NOLA Gold and 2021 MLR Champion, Luke Carty. the USA Capped Irishman began his MLR career with the LA Giltinis in 2021, earning 18 appearances including 15 during their Shield-winning season in 2021. Following the withdrawal of the Giltinis, Carty headed to Chicago where he scored a career high 69pts for the Hounds in 2023, totaling 127pts in 27 games in the Windy City, where he remains the Hounds all-time leading scorer. He surprised fans by signing with the NOLA Gold ahead of the 2025 season, where he’s scored 31pts in 5 games so far. In his MLR career, Luke Carty has 1 try and 208pts scored with a 67.74% success rate from the tee (84/124). Congratulations, Luke!

Moving to NOLA’s opposition from Round 9, Old Glory DC, who were able to celebrate a pair of 50th appearances, although they did celebrate one a bit prematurely! Cory Daniel has finished as MLR’s Top Tackler twice already in his career, and is the reigning ‘tackle king’ heading into 2025. Old Glory DC celebrated Daniel’s 50th game with DC after last week’s clash with the Seattle Seawolves, but unfortunately this was only his 49th game… Thankfully, this little faux pas can be forgotten as Daniel has now reached 50 games played with the Flags! A Maryland native, USA Eagle Cory Daniel has spent his entire MLR career with Old Glory DC, starting 45 of his 50 games since 2021 and racking up an incredible 770 tackles. This includes two seasons where he recorded over 250 tackles in a season, in 2022 (255) and in 2024, when he set a MLR record 276. Congratulations, Cory!

Source: @Oldglorydc via Instagram

Although Cory Daniel is the only player in this weeks’ Appearance Achievements section to have played all 50 of his MLR games with Old Glory DC, he’s not the only Flags player to reach the half-century mark. New Zealand utility back Jason Emery also played his 50th MLR game for Old Glory DC in Round 9! Emery started his MLR career with Rugby New York in 2022, scoring 48pts in 17 games as the Ironworkers lifted the Shield that year. Across his two years in New York, Emery scored 8 tries and 123pts in 33 games, starting 29 times. Following the withdrawal of the Ironworkers in 2023, Emery signed in LA for Rugby FC LA‘s inaugural season in 2024 before moving back to the east coast this year with Old Glory DC. In his career to date, Emery has scored 147pts with a 73.02% success rate from the tee (46/63) and started 43 of his 50 MLR games. Congratulations, Jason!

Wrapping Up

A new Top Scorer in Los Angeles, a bumper week for the Gold, another handful of players join the half-century club and that’s not even all of the standout stats from Round 9 of Major League Rugby’s 2025 season! What goodies will Round 10 hold for us as we move into the second half of this season, still no closer to knowing who will come out on top? You’ll have to come back next week to find out!

Thank you for reading! If you like this series, please get in touch on social media and share this article to help highlight these achievements! If there’s anything that has been missed that you feel is worth mentioning, you can reach out to NARDB via the ‘Contact’ tab on this site. Alternatively, you can reach out to NARDB or James on social media: @MLRStats on Instagram/Threads, @JamDelay & @NARugbyDB on Twitter/X, and @JamDelay & @NARDB on Bluesky! NARDB also has a Youtube channel: NARStats!

Finally, If you’re looking to get your hands on some of the new Macron merch for 2025 or add to your jersey collection, visit shopmlr.com to get your hands on that new gear, and remember to use code ‘MLRSTATS’ at checkout for 15% off your order!

Midweek Milestones: Standout Stats from Round 7 of MLR2025!

NARDatabase

James Deeley

Round 7 of the 2025 Major League Rugby season saw all 5 games on Saturday for the 3rd week in a row, with every game kicking off within 3 hours of each other, so tries, kick-offs, and (most importantly) stats were coming thick and fast! Welcome back to Midweek Milestones, a weekly article that highlights the big achievements and standout stats from each round of the MLR season.

In case you haven’t read any of the previous Midweek Milestones, these weekly articles highlight milestones or standout stats achieved by players and teams that might have gone under the radar in order to bring more attention to them, as well as inform fans of some of the big milestones and the less publicized (but no less deserving) achievements around the League for each match week. If you want to read previous Midweek Milestones articles, feel free to search ‘Midweek Milestones’, or click on the category just below the title of this article!

NOLA Gold reach a century!

Following Utah last week, the NOLA Gold played in their 100th MLR game to become the 3rd team to play their century game this season, and the 5th team in MLR history to reach triple-figures! The Gold broke a strange pattern in their 100th game, becoming both the first team to play their 100th game in front of a home crowd, and the first team to face an expansion team in their 100th game, falling 18-20 to the Chicago Hounds in a nail-biter!

With the NOLA Gold reaching their 100th game, all five of the still active MLR founding member teams have now reached a century of games played! It’ll be a little while before the next team reaches this milestone. The New England Free Jacks are closest, on only 81 games, so we’ll have to wait until at least the 2nd half of the 2026 season!

LA & DC play a Slobberknocker!

The Flags travelled to Los Angeles to face RFCLA in a chaotic cross-conference clash! There were 13 tries in total with a final score of 54-44 to the hosts in what was the 3rd highest scoring game in Major League Rugby history! The total of 98pts falls just behind the 108pts scored in a 49-59 victory for Rugby New York in 2022, and the 101pts scored in a 42-59 victory for Houston the week before!

Unfortunately for Old Glory DC, they have now featured in all of the 3 highest scoring games in MLR history, and have been on the losing side of all three. For 2025, DC seem to be following a pattern of alternating wins & losses. So far this season they have always followed up a loss with a win, and always lost the game after a win. Are they destined for another .500 season?

Old Glory DC have featured in the 3 highest scoring games in MLR history

Moving over to the home side, Rugby FC LA were able to hold on for a victory despite a handful of cards including two yellows and a red to scrum-half Gonzalo Bertranou. This victory puts LA on their longest win streak as a franchise, winning 3 on the trot to even up their record at 3-3 so far in 2025! Helping them to that victory was Christian Dyer, a California native and USA Eagle who joined RFCLA from the Houston SaberCats ahead of the 2025 season. Dyer scored his first try with his new team in this game, also marking the 20th try of his MLR career and entering the Top 20 players all time, tied for 20th with the likes of Sam Windsor and JP Smith. Congratulations, Christian!

Appearance Achievements

Checking in on some appearance milestones for last weekend, there was a 50th appearance for the Seattle Seawolves as well as a pair of MLR debuts which is where we’ll start, with Old Glory DC. The section above covers much of the Flags’ game from Round 7, but it didn’t highlight a MLR debut for Welshman Joe Rees. A native of Swansea and former Wales U20 prop, Rees was signed early in the off-season from the English Championship, where he captained London Scottish. Congratulations, Joe, and welcome to MLR!

Round 7’s other debutant was also in the Eastern Conference, for the other team in red, white, & blue, the New England Free Jacks! Canadian Sevens star Josiah Morra came off the bench in the Free Jacks’ sensational comeback victory over the Utah Warriors. Morra is capped for Canada at both Sevens and 15s levels, and actually featured for the Ontario Arrows (the precursor of MLR’s Toronto Arrows) in a 40-14 victory against the Free Jacks in New England’s first ever game as a team. Morra was on the bench earlier this season but didn’t feature, so congratulations on your debut Josiah, and welcome to MLR!

Heading to the Western Conference to recognise a half-century of appearances, Seattle Seawolves center Dan Kriel earned his 50th Major League Rugby appearance in a hard-fought 25-17 victory over Anthem RC in front of a home crowd! The Cape Town native and brother of Springbok Jesse Kriel, Dan joined the Seawolves for the 2022 season and has been a mainstay of the Seattle lineup ever since, becoming the 7th player to earn 50 appearances for the Seawolves. He has recorded well over 3,000m made in his MLR career to date as well as just shy of 450 tackles, scoring 11 tries and 55pts in total. Kriel and the Seawolves have finished as MLR Runners up twice, in 2022 and in 2024, and he was the recipient of the S. Marcus Calloway Award in 2023, honoring the player who shows remarkable passion, excellence, and integrity on and off the field. Congratulations on your 50th MLR appearance, Dan!

Source: @SeawolvesRugby via Instagram

Scoring Standouts

Moving from appearance milestones to standout stats around scoring. There are now 14 teams in Major League Rugby that have scored over 1,000pts, after the Chicago Hounds reached 4-figures during their hard fought victory over the NOLA Gold on Saturday. The Hounds were sat on 996pts scored coming into Round 7, and Dylan Fawsitt’s try (who else?) just before half-time took Chicago over the 1000pts mark! With a 18-20 victory they now sit on 1,016pts scored as a team, and begin the long march to 2k.

Moving from team scoring milestones to player milestones, and moving from Chicago in the Eastern Conference to the Houston SaberCats in the West. The ‘Cats dominated the San Diego Legion (who seem to hate playing at SaberCats Stadium!) to put an end to the Legion’s 5 game win streak, and extend their own win streak to 5 games. South African scrumhalf André Warner dotted down for the SaberCats’ first try in a 34-14 victory, marking his 10th try in MLR! Warner is only the 8th Houston player to record 10+ tries with the team after recording 8 in 2024 and bagging his 2nd in 2025. Congratulations, André!

Staying on the Houston SaberCats, in the same game that André Warner recorded his 10th MLR try, AJ Alatimu came off the bench and slotted a penalty kick to pass 100pts scored as a member of the Houston SaberCats! Alatimu, who started his MLR career with the Seattle Seawolves in 2021, is only the 3rd SaberCat to pass 100pts with the team, behind Davy Coetzer (340) and Sam Windsor (432)! This proved to be a very important 3pts for Alatimu because not only did he pass 100pts with Houston, but it took his career total to 422, passing San Diego Legion legend Joe Pietersen (420) for the 2nd highest poinst scorer in MLR history! He now only sits behind Sam Windsor (595). Congratulations, AJ!

AJ Alatimu becomes MLR’s 2nd Highest Scorer

AJ Alatimu moving into 2nd wasn’t the only bit of movement at the top of the All-Time Scorers List! The eagle-eyed among you will have noticed that the above graphic lists Old Glory DC‘s Jason Robertson in 5th place All-Time which, after this weekend, he is! The Kiwi playmaker recorded 13pts in the Flags’ high scoring defeat to Rugby FC LA, setting the MLR Round-High in points for a second week in a row, moving ahead of Mack Mason and into the Top 5! He’s almost guaranteed to pass Toronto Arrows legend Sam Malcolm for 4th this season, too. Congratulations, Jason!

Wrapping Up

The last active founding member team reaches a century of games played, Old Glory DC‘s unfavourable record in high-scoring games, and plenty of scoring & appearances achievements in this week’s edition of Midweek Milestones! Be sure to check back next week to see what standout stats Round 8 of the 2025 Major League Rugby season holds!

Thank you for reading! If you like this series, please get in touch on social media and share this article to help highlight these achievements! If there’s anything that has been missed that you feel is worth mentioning, you can reach out to NARDB via the ‘Contact’ tab on this site. Alternatively, you can reach out to NARDB or James on social media: @MLRStats on Instagram/Threads, @JamDelay & @NARugbyDB on Twitter/X, and @JamDelay and @NARDB on Bluesky!

Finally, If you’re looking to get your hands on some of the new Macron merch for 2025 or add to your jersey collection, visit shopmlr.com to get your hands on that new gear, and remember to use code ‘MLRSTATS’ at checkout for 15% off your order!

Midweek Milestones: Standout Stats from Round 6 of MLR2025!

NARDatabase

James Deeley

Round 6 roughly marks the final round of the first third of the 2025 Major League Rugby season, and so far it’s been a thriller. There are historically good teams faltering, there are written off teams on win streaks, and Anthem RC creep closer to that first victory. Welcome to the Midweek Milestones article for Round 6!

Just in case you haven’t read any of the previous Midweek Milestones articles, these weekly posts highlight milestones or standout stats achieved by players and teams that might have gone under the radar in order to bring more attention to them, as well as inform fans of some of the big milestones and the less publicized (but no less deserving) achievements around the League for each match week.

Utah join the 100 Club!

The Utah Warriors join the likes of the Seattle Seawolves, San Diego Legion, and Houston SaberCats to become the 4th team in MLR history to reach 100 games played in the competition! They are the 2nd team to win their 100th MLR fixture, claiming a 27-30 road victory over the Seattle Seawolves to secure their 41st victory as a team. The Warriors have an all-time record of 41-3-56, which includes both 98 regular season games (41-3-54) and 2 playoff appearances (0-2).

The Utah Warriors’ 100th game falls in line with a very strange pattern. All 4 teams that have reached 100 games played in MLR have played their 100th match on the road against a fellow founding member. No team has played their 100th game in front of a home crowd yet!

Heartbreak for Anthem RC

The USA’s rising rugby stars are still looking for their first win as a franchise and came agonizingly close in Round 6 as Anthem RC had their hearts broken by a last minute Davy Coetzer penalty. The aspiring Eagles fell 45-46 in Charlotte, having set new single game franchise records for points scored (45) and tries scored (7). The 45pts scored by Anthem RC in this game accounted for over 10% of the points ever scored by the team!

As further proof that Anthem are closing the gap, their average losing margin in 2024 was an eyebrow raising 23pts. So far in 2025 that has fallen to 15pts and in their last 3 games the gap is, on average, just 2pts. Anthem picked up 1 losing BP all season last year, but have picked up 3 in a row in 2025 (including this game) and have secured try BPs in two of those as well. Although it might not seem like much, Anthem RC are moving in the right direction and it’s just a matter of time before they claim that elusive first win. Will it come before their next bye week in Round 13?

Kicking Credits

A handful of kickers made noteworthy news over the weekend, whether that be for reaching new scoring milestones or other standout stats.

We begin with Jason Robertson, who had arguably a First XV-worthy performance for Old Glory DC as they routed their Eastern Conference rivals the New England Free Jacks in the first of two ‘Red, White, & Blue Bowl’ matchups in 2025. Not only did Robertson pass the 2,000m made mark to become the 5th player to reach 2,000m made with the Flags, but he scored 13pts including a rare drop goal. Amazingly, this is the FIFTH drop goal of Jason Robertson’s MLR career and he now take sole possession of the record for the most drop goals scored in MLR history! What’s more, Robertson missed another drop goal attempt in the same game! He passes San Diego Legion legend Joe Pietersen, who had 4.

On the subject of the San Diego Legion, they recorded a convincing victory over the Miami Sharks in Florida, with Lincoln McClutchie assuming the role of place kicker. The New Zealander converted 3 tries for 6pts, pushing his MLR and Legion total past the 100pt mark to 104! McClutchie is just the 5th player to pass 100pts scored for the Legion, and is currently sat on 23pts this season to add to his 81pts from 2024. Congratulations, Lincoln!

A little way up the road from McClutchie is USA Eagle Luke Carty, who’s enjoying his first season in New Orleans with the Gold. Carty banked another 2pts in the Gold‘s 24-31 loss to Rugby FC LA over the weekend to just nudge his career total over 200pts after coming off of the bench. Although his time with NOLA has only just begun, Carty has already racked up 24pts with the Gold this season and is only the 16th player in MLR history (9th active player) to pass 200pts in the competition! Congratulations, Luke!

NOLA Gold’s Luke Carty

Staying on the subject of kickers but moving to the Gold’s opposition this weekend, Rugby FC LA. The 2nd incarnation of a MLR team in Los Angeles appear to be finding their groove, securing back-to-back victories the last few weeks. In fact, with another 31pts scored over the weekend, RFCLA have become the first 2024 Expansion Team to pass 500pts scored as a franchise! They sit on 506pts scored in total, with Andrew Coe‘s 58th minute try taking the lads from Los Angeles over the milestone.

A key part of Rugby FC LA‘s scoring has been international rugby veteran Christian Leali’ifano. Test capped for both Australia and Samoa, Leali’ifano is currently tied as MLR’s leading points scorer with 40 on the season so far. Coming into Round 6, he had a flawless record from the tee with 15/15, the best record in MLR! It turns out that the 37yo is human after all however, as Leali’ifano missed his first two place kicks of the season in Round 6. Let’s blame them on the wind, shall we?

Appearance Achievements

In what is quickly becoming it’s own segment within these Midweek Milestones articles, there were a number of players celebrating milestone appearances over the weekend, starting with a pair of MLR debuts!

After being named on the bench in Round 5 but not used, Hawaiian former football player Isikeli Kava earned his Major League Rugby debut on the 2nd attempt when he came off the bench for Old Glory DC in the 77th minute of their convincing 28-14 victory over the New England Free Jacks. Kava played with the American Raptors crossover program before joining the Flags for the 2025 season, and made 3 tackles in his MLR debut. Congratulations, Isikeli!

MLR Debutant Isikeli Kava (center)


Round 6’s other debutant was another #18. Nova Scotia native and test-capped Canadian Prop Tyler Matchem came off the bench for the NOLA Gold in the 67th minute to earn his first MLR appearance and help the Gold to salvage 2pts from their 24-31 defeat to Rugby FC LA. Congratulations, Tyler!

From debuts to half-centuries, three US-eligible players reached 50 appearances in MLR over the course of Round 6, including a very impressive MLR first for one of them! Starting on the West Coast with the San Diego Legion, Australian back rower and 2021 MLR Champion Christian Poidevin earned his 50th MLR appearance and his 44th start in the competition! The son of 1991 RWC Winner Simon Poidevin, Christian earned 28 appearances with the LA Giltinis between 2021-2022 before joining the Legion in 2023 where he has earned 22 further appearances. Poidevin is eligible for the USA through his Chicago-born mother, and has scored 13 tries in MLR including 3 in 5 games to start 2025! To date, he has made 1,429m in possession and completed 591 tackles with a high of 200 in 2022. Congratulations, Christian!

Staying in the Western Conference but moving to the Lone Star State, Houston SaberCats’ forward Emmanuel Albert also reaches his 50th appearance in MLR! The Minnesota native has developed into a certified MLR starter over his 4 years in Texas, with 11 of his 14 career starts coming in the last 2 seasons, including 5 starts in 5 games so far in 2025. Albert has scored 3 MLR tries and is approaching both 1,000m made in possession & 350 tackles completed and, after setting career highs in both categories last season, is well on track to do the same again this year! Albert was drafted 2nd overall by the Houston SaberCats in the 2021 MLR Collegiate Draft out of Lindenwood University, meaning that his half-century of games comes with an MLR first: Emmanuel Albert is the first MLR Draftee to reach 50 games played in the competition! This is a testament to the viability of the draft and the player pathway system, as well as to Albert’s hard work and determination. Congratulations, Emmanuel!

Source: @usmlr via Instagram

The final player to enter the 50-cap club in Round 6 is Ex-Rugby New York Ironworker and 2022 MLR Champion, Connor Buckley! The Iona College alum earned his 19th appearance (11th start) for Old Glory DC in their victory over New England, to add to his 31 games for New York between 2021-2023! Buckley has 30 starts in his MLR career and 9 tries including the first (and to date, only) playoff hat trick in MLR history in the 2024 Eastern Conference Semifinal, also against New England. Congratulations, Connor!

Wrapping Up

Another team joins the 100 club, a trio of kickers reach new scoring milestones, and a handful of players earn appearance achievements! That does it for all the standout stats from another week of Major league Rugby action, and the Midweek Milestones article for Round 6 of the 2025 season. Be sure to check back next week for Midweek Milestones from the 7th match week of the 2025 Major League Rugby season, we we see more MLR firsts?

If you like this series, please get in touch on social media and share this article to help highlight these achievements! If there’s anything that has been missed that you feel is worth mentioning, you can reach out to NARDB via the ‘Contact’ tab on this site. Alternatively, you can reach out to NARDB or James on social media: @MLRStats on Instagram/Threads, @JamDelay & @NARugbyDB on Twitter/X, and @JamDelay and @NARDB on Bluesky!

Finally, If you’re looking to get your hands on some of the new Macron merch for 2025 or add to your jersey collection, visit shopmlr.com to get your hands on that new gear, and remember to use code ‘MLRSTATS’ at checkout for 15% off your order!

Midweek Milestones: Standout Stats from Round 4 of MLR2025!

NARDatabase

James Deeley

It’s hard to believe, but we’re already rough a quarter of the way through Major League Rugby’s 2025 season! Thankfully, there’s plenty of rugby left to be played in what has been a thrilling season so far. This article will highlight some of the standout stats and achievements from both players and teams from Round 4 of the 2025 season.

Welcome back to Midweek Milestones, the weekly series that aims to highlight milestones achieved by players and/or teams that may go under the radar otherwise, but are no less worthy of recognition and praise. This series of articles will be released midweek (clue is in the name!) and will cover some the high profile, and less publicized milestones achieved during the latest round of Major League Rugby action!

Houston Hit 100!

On Saturday, the Houston SaberCats became the 3rd team in Major League Rugby History to play their 100th game in the competition, following other MLR Founding Members the Seattle Seawolves (108 games played) and San Diego Legion (103 games played). The ‘Cats played their 97th regular season game against the Utah Warriors, adding to the 3 post-season games that have featured the Houston team, and hold an overall record of 46-54!

As you can read in the above graphic (posted to the NARDB Socials, see at the bottom of this article for details and be sure to follow!), with a convincing 17-37 road victory over a Utah Warriors side that was flying high after their impressive first two games, the Houston SaberCats became the first team in league history to actually WIN their 100th MLR game, passing 2,500pts scored as they did it. The Seattle Seawolves were the first MLR team to play in their 100th game, but their party was spoiled by the SaberCats (appropriately) by a score of 28-25. The San Diego Legion were the 2nd team to play their 100th game, but were defeated by the Seattle Seawolves by a score of 30-28 in the 2024 Western Conference Semifinal!

Interestingly, the three teams that have reached 100 MLR games played have all played their 100th game on the road and have all played another founding member for their 100th game. The next team to reach triple-figures games played in MLR will be the SaberCats’ most recent opponents, the Utah Warriors, who are currently on 98 games played. They will follow the peculiar pattern, playing their 100th game on the road against a MLR Founding Member, the Seattle Seawolves in Round 6 of the 2025 season!

A Pair of Half-Centuries!

For the 2nd week in a row a New England Free Jacks player has reached their 50th Major league Rugby Appearance! Last week, Captain Joe Johnston became the 5th player to reach 50 games played for New England and incidentally, Johnston scored his 10th try for New England over the weekend to become the 13th player to reach 10 tries scored for the Free Jacks. This week, prop Kaleb Geiger earned his 50th MLR cap over the weekend but unlike Johnston, these were not all for the Free Jacks.

A native of Colorado, Geiger is arguably the most successful product of the Colorado/American Raptors crossover program, having played football before turning to rugby. He began his MLR journey as a hooker with Rugby New York in 2021, earning his debut in 2022 when he scored 5 tries and started 7 of his 17 appearances as New York claimed their first and only MLR Shield. He continued to represent New York until the Ironworkers withdrew from the competition in late 2023, at which point he joined the New England Free Jacks, appearing in 14 games as they claimed their 2nd of back-to-back Shields, making Geiger one of the few MLR players to have won Shields with multiple teams! Geiger has started 21 of his 50 MLR appearances to date, scoring 7 tries , completing 405 tackles and making over 1,250m!

Also earning their 50th Major league Rugby appearance over the weekend was test capped Canadian centre, Spencer Jones! Born in Canada but raised in New Zealand, Jones began his MLR career with the Toronto Arrows, signing with the Canadian team ahead of their inaugural MLR season in 2019 and playing there for 4 seasons. He earned 32 appearances for the Arrows, starting 27 times and scoring 3 tries and 26pts before moving to the New England Free Jacks for the 2023 season, where he started 6 of his 13 games to help the Free Jacks to their first MLR Shield title. Following a season in Quincy, Jones was traded to the Utah Warriors, where he earned 2 starts in the 2024 season before suffering a season-ending injury. He returned for the Warriors in 2025, starting all 3 of their games so far this season. In his career, Spencer Jones as started 38 of his 50 MLR appearances, scoring 6 tries and 41pts in total! He passed 2,000m made in his MLR career over the weekend, now sitting at 2,015m made and 387 tackles completed!

Source: @utahwarriorsrugby via Instagram. While it is definitely Jones’ 50th MLR appearance, the numbers listed in the above post are largely incorrect.

Wrapping up

The Houston SaberCats reach a Century of games played, and two MLR Champions play in their 50th games! A shorter than usual article for this 4th edition of Midweek Milestones, but when you’re dealing with numbers, sometimes that’s bound to happen! Thanks very much for taking the time to read this article, and be sure to check back next week for Midweek Milestones from Round 5 of the 2025 Major League Rugby season!

If you like this series, please get in touch on social media and share this article to help highlight these achievements! If there’s anything that has been missed that you feel is worth mentioning, you can reach out to NARDB via the ‘Contact’ tab on this site. Alternatively, you can reach out to NARDB or James on social media: @MLRStats on Instagram/Threads, @JamDelay & @NARugbyDB on Twitter/X, and @JamDelay and @NARDB on Bluesky!

Finally, If you’re looking to get your hands on some of the new Macron merch for 2025 or add to your jersey collection, visit shopmlr.com to get your hands on that new gear, and remember to use code ‘MLRSTATS’ at checkout for 15% off your order!

Midweek Milestones: Standout Stats from Round 2 of MLR2025!

NARDatabase

James Deeley

Round 2 of Major League Rugby’s 2025 season is already in the books, and early bye weeks are already playing their part on this young season with only 4 games last weekend. Luckily, there was no shortage of stats to give us plenty to talk about in this 2nd edition of Midweek Milestones!

Midweek Milestones is a weekly series of articles that aims to highlight milestones achieved by players and/or teams that may go under the radar otherwise, but are no less worthy of recognition and praise. This series of articles will be released midweek (clue is in the name…) each week, and will take milestones from the latest round of MLR matches during the 2025 season.

Dylan Fawsitt: MLR’s First Centurion!

It was close to impossible to miss the congratulations from around the league (and indeed, the world!) for ‘The Butcher’ this weekend, but just in case: Dylan Fawsitt became the first player in Major League Rugby history to reach 100 games played in the competition! The Chicago Hounds couldn’t secure the victory, but that shouldn’t take anything away from this outstanding achievement. This article will focus on a few of the numbers from Fawsitt’s exceptional MLR career, but an excellent article on Fawsitt’s story can be found below, written by Joe Harvey:

https://www.majorleague.rugby/news/the-man-they-call-butcher-introducing-dylan-fawsitt-as-the-first-mlr-centurion/

A stalwart of MLR since it’s inaugural season in 2018, many fans will be familiar with the USA-capped Irishman from his time playing with New York between 2019-2023, where he lifted the Shield in 2022 and scored over 40 tries. However, many may forget that his first MLR try came with the Glendale Raptors during the 2018 season, where he earned his first 8 MLR appearances, starting 6 times and finishing as an MLR Runner-Up.

As mentioned, Fawsitt became a prolific try scorer with New York and that has continued with the Chicago Hounds. The Butcher has 16 tries in 20 games for the Hounds since joining them for the 2024 season following the demise of the Ironworkers, and even added his league-leading 58th MLR try in his 100th MLR game alongside former Raptors team mate, Bryce Campbell. Fawsitt’s 58th try takes his points total to 290, good enough for 10th on MLR’s all time list, without a single place kick (although there have been a couple of famous 50:22s!).

Perhaps the most incredible stat around Dylan Fawsitt’s monumental achievement is that he has appeared in more MLR games than 9 of the 11 teams competing in Major League Rugby’s 2025 season. This includes 3 founder clubs (the Houston SaberCats, Utah Warriors, and NOLA Gold) that have been competing since the inaugural season in 2018!

San Diego Run Riot in The Queen City!

From MLR’s first Centurion, to the Legion. San Diego continued their impressive start to the season with an 8-try rout of Anthem RC on the road. Surprisingly for MLR’s winningest franchise, their 5-52 road victory was only the 3rd time in franchise history that the Legion have scored 50+ points in a game, and they were just 1pt behind their single game record (14-53 against Dallas in 2022). They did however, set a new franchise record for their biggest ever winning margin of 47pts, surpassing the 39pts set in that 2022 game against Dallas.

Named as MLR’s Team of the Week for Round 2, the San Diego Legion scored 8 tries including Tomas Aoake‘s 2nd in as many games, becoming just the 2nd player to reach 20 tries scored for the Legion behind Nate Augspurger who recorded 22 tries while in San Diego. Congratulations, Tomas! On the Legion bench while Aoake scored his 20th try was new signing for 2025, Alesana Pohla. He was acquired from the Utah Warriors, where he played in 2024 and came off the bench for the second half to earn his San Diego Legion debut. What Pohla probably didn’t realise is that in doing so, he became the 150th different player to represent San Diego in an MLR game. Congratulations, Alesana!

Coetzer Enters Elite Company!

The Houston SaberCats get out of the starting blocks with their first win of 2025 over a tenacious Rugby FC LA team in California, following their surprise defeat against the Chicago Hounds in Round 1. Sticking with the sprinting analogy, the ‘Cats fell at the final hurdle a number of times as they were held up over the line, but eventually got things clicking and ended up scoring 7 tries, 3 of which were converted by South African fly-half, Davy Coetzer. Over his 4 seasons with the SaberCats, Coetzer has been a regular behind the kicking tee, finishing 2nd in MLR Scoring in 2023 with a personal best of 135pts. His 6pts on Sunday took his MLR total over the 300pt mark, to 302!

With his 16 tries (one 7-pointer), 20 successful penalties, 80 conversions and success rate off the tee of basically an even 70%, Coetzer is just the 9th player in Major League Rugby history to pass the 300pts scored mark! US fans should keep an eye on Coetzer if they aren’t already, as he’s expressed an interest in pursuing Eagles eligibility and with plenty of runway left this season, it’s possible that he could reach 400pts scored in MLR and enter a truly legendary group.

Damm Reaches Half-Century!

Perhaps slightly eclipsed by Fawsitt’s century of appearances was another appearance milestone from a USA Eagle over in Los Angeles. Rugby FC LA Captain Jason Damm earned his 50th MLR appearance in his 17th game for the team, the very same game where Davy Coetzer surpassed the 300pt mark!

Like Fawsitt, Damm began his MLR career with the Glendale Raptors, where he earned 3 appearances and his first MLR start in 2019. Most fans familiar with Damm will know that his career really took off with Rugby ATL, however. The Marietta, Georgia native played for his hometown MLR team between 2020-2023, scoring 8 tries and earning 30 of his 50 appearances with the RATLers as well as finishing as a MLR Runner-Up in 2021. His performances in Atlanta earned him his test debut for the USA against Chile in July of 2022.

Source: @Rugbyfcla via Twitter/X

Jason Damm followed the team to Los Angeles following the sale of Rugby ATL and it’s relocation to the West Coast in 2023, joining Rugby FC LA for their inaugural season in 2024 where he had a career year. He earned 15 appearances with a career high 14 starts, also earning career highs in tries scored (7) and tackles made, finishing in the top 10 league wide with 172. Damm was named as the RFCLA Captain for the 2025 season is continuing his impressive tackle rate, currently sat 2nd in MLR on 36 tackles in his two games. Congratulations on reaching 50 MLR appearances, Jason!

To Conclude

A handful of milestones for the San Diego Legion, an All-Time Top 10 points scorer continues to rack them up, and a pair of appearance milestones including an MLR first! That does it for your round-up of standout stats from Round 2 of the 2025 Major League Rugby season in this 2nd edition of Midweek Milestones.

If you like this series, please let me know on social media and share this article to bring attention to these achievements! If there’s anything that may have been missed that you feel is worth mentioning, you can reach out to NARDB via the ‘Contact’ tab on this site. Alternatively, you can reach out to NARDB or James via social media: @MLRStats on Instagram/Threads, @JamDelay & @NARugbyDB on Twitter/X, and @JamDelay and @NARDB on Bluesky!

If you’re looking to get your hands on some of the new Macron merch for 2025, Visit shopmlr.com to get your hands on that new gear, and remember to use code ‘MLRSTATS’ at checkout for 15% off your order!

MLR Player Movement Summary: January 20-26, 2025

NARDatabase

James Deeley

Welcome back to NARDB’s weekly Major League Rugby Off-Season Player Movement Summary Series. On a weekly basis, this series dives deeper into every single roster move announced by teams during the MLR Off-Season. This particular article covers the moves from January 20th to 26th, 2025.

Pre-Season camps are in full swing for all 11 MLR teams, with under 3 weeks to go until the 2025 season kicks off on February 15th. This didn’t stop one team from dominating last week’s summary. It seems hard to believe that the team hadn’t finalised these deals months ago, but maybe they forgot the announcements, and only remembered when these players reported. As always, this article will start with the summary graphic, before diving into the re-signings:

Summary of Player Movement Around MLR: January 20-26, 2025 (1 of 1)

Re-Signings

Last week’s busiest team was easily the Utah Warriors. Warriors fans seem to have largely recovered from the early off-season announcement of 17 departing players, and are looking forward to see the team take a step forward in 2025. The return of the team’s all-time top scorer and former captain, Joel Hodgson, will make taking that step forward significantly easier. The English ex-Newcastle Falcons Fly-half has appeared in all 32 games the Warriors have played since 2023, starting all but 1 of them. He finished 3rd in MLR scoring last season with 111pts in 16 games (15 starts) and a 65% success rate from the tee. After only 2 seasons in MLR, Hodgson already sits 12th all-time in terms of scoring with 233pts, and will no doubt be looking to break into the Top 10 in 2025.

Trade Targets

Along with announcing the return of their franchise points scorer, the Utah Warriors started the week with a Western Conference Trade with the San Diego Legion. The Legion acquired wing/center Alesana Pohla from the Utah Warriors in exchange for 2025 Cap Space. Unfortunately, as with all MLR trades the exact amount of Cap Space that the Utah Warriors received in this deal isn’t publically known, nor is the Salary Cap itself. Maybe one day. Alesana Pohla made his MLR debut for the Warriors in 2024, and started two of his 6 MLR games that season, amassing just shy of 200m gained in possession. He does not qualify as a domestic player just yet, so this may limit his game time with the Legion, but he certainly proved an effective runner with the Warriors last season.

Source: MLR Trade Wire

New Faces

The Utah Warriors were going for the full set last week. In addition to a re-signing and a trade, they also announced the addition of a pair of new players, one of which is a familiar name to MLR fans, and one will be enjoying his debut MLR season in 2025. The familiar name, especially for Dallas Jackals fans, is Ronnie McElligott. The Californian back row was drafted 32nd overall out of St. Mary’s College in 2023 by the Dallas Jackals, and earned 7 MLR appearances off the bench during his debut MLR season. McElligott was not selected in the Dallas Jackals Dispersal Draft shortly after their withdrawal from MLR, but the Warriors sign the former SMC Gael for his sophomore season in the league. The new face who will enjoy his debut MLR season in 2025 is Amulone ‘Lone’ Ika. Born in Utah so will count as a domestic player, Ika was raised in Tonga where he represented the Tonga U20s in 2014. He has had two stints in the Australian Shute Shield with the Western Sydney Two Blues, and in between, was coaching and playing in Utah. Ika is currently serving as assistant coach for the Utah Valley University rugby side.

There was another new face confirmed to be joining MLR for 2025, but this one is not without it’s share of controversy. The Houston SaberCats announced the signing of capped Scotland winger Rufus McLean for their 2025 campaign. The 24yo winger has earned 3 caps for Scotland, and scored a pair of tries on his test debut against Tonga in October 2021 after coming up through the Glasgow Warriors system. McLean’s contract with the Glasgow Warriors was terminated in 2023 however, and here is where the controversy comes in. That same year, McLean admitted, and was convicted of, domestic abuse against his girlfriend, for which he was issued a 10-year non-harassment order and sentenced to 120 hours of community service. Since then, Scotland, the Glasgow Warriors, and all other European clubs have steered clear of the once-promising winger. Usually this would (and should) kill a career, but McLean has the benefit of having been born in Boston, keeping the door open to play in the United States. The American Raptors announced the signing of McLean for their 2024 Super Rugby Americas season, in a move that was met with a poor reception. Since the Raptors are not playing professional rugby in 2025, McLean turned his attention to MLR, where the Houston SaberCats have picked him up. Concerningly for ‘Cats fans, they have a history of signing controversial figures. Former LSU football player Drake Davis represented them in 2024, and Jeremy Misailegalu has played for them for the past two seasons (although Missile’s controversy is a different situation that merits a second chance). It is the view of NARDB that a player with a recent history like Rufus McLean should not be given the opportunity to play professional sports considering what we know, but everyone deserves a second chance. The question that MLR fans should be asking the SaberCats (and for that matter, the Raptors before them), is: What has McLean done to prove that he is worthy of a second chance, other than being born in the USA?

Departures

Among the Utah Warriors’ busy week was a departure that likely went under the radar for many MLR fans, perhaps even among a large chunk of Old Glory DC fans, who may not even know the player in question, despite playing with the team in 2024. Kevin Brou is a US-eligble front row from the Ivory Coast who was signed by the Flags for their 2024 Campaign, but suffered a broken leg in the pre-season and was sidelined for the entire year. FCY, in the French 6th tier the Fédérale 2, announced the signing of Brou for their 2024/25 season way back in September, but thanks to Bryan Ray on Twitter, MLR audiences are learning about this move now. Marking an end to Brou’s unfortunate stint in MLR, at least for now.

Anthem RC Finally Break the Silence

After what feels like months of MLR’s newest team, Anthem RC, being the only team not announcing players for their 2025 season, the MLR, USA Rugby and World Rugby partnership team finally unveiled their full 37 man roster on January 21st. This is two whole weeks into pre-season camp. The team has been publishing numerous images from training sessions, but as they had made no effort to market any of their players, fans had little to no clue who was in said pictures. As mentioned, Anthem RC is a partnership between MLR, USA Rugby, and World Rugby to usher in the next era of USA Eagles ahead of their home (mens) Rugby World Cup in 2031, and as such their primary goal may not be to make a profit as it might be for other teams around the league (NARDB is aware that as of the date this article was published, no team is making a profit), but if these players are on the shortlist to represent the National Team, then market them. A few days before the team announced the roster, they announced that Patrick Stack has been appointed the first team president, with the mission of ‘focusing on revenue generation’ among other things, so hopefully this changes. To not announce a single player before the third week of pre-season camp is ridiculous. Rosters should be finalised and made public prior to January 1st.

To finally get to the Anthem RC roster itself, it was largely as expected. Despite the paragraph above, it’s still the MLR and as we know, MLR has more leaks than a sieve. There are a few notable departures from their 2024 roster, such as top try scorer and MLR veteran Te Rangatira Waitokia, 2023 San Diego Legion draftee Tyren Al-Jiboori, and USA Sevens star David Still, but the team added lots of young talent as well as a number of USA Eagles with significant MLR experience in the likes of Mitch Wilson, Conner Mooneyham, and Sam Golla, as well as five of their six 2024 draftees. They picked up a number of players from the Dallas Jackals when they withdrew from MLR, as well as the Jackals Head Coach Agustin Cavalieri, who is serving as Anthem RC Assistant Coach in 2025. While it’s unlikely that Anthem will challenge for the Shield in 2024, they’re primed to take a big step in the right direction, and the key question is: How long before their first MLR victory?

In Conclusion

Judging from the previous few weeks, it is likely that we can expect a few more announcements out of the Utah Warriors, but as we move into February the moves will get fewer and further between, apart from perhaps the odd last minute trade. These weekly articles will continue as long as there are moves to discuss, but NARDB will be shifting it’s focus to pre-season preparation which will include fact files on each MLR team in the coming days.

As always, you can follow NARDB and James across social media to stay up to date on signings as they happen. @MLRStats on Instagram/Threads, @JamDelay & @NARugbyDB on Twitter/X, and @JamDelay and @NARDB on Bluesky! Also, we’re happy to have Rugby Now back for the 2025 season! Visit shopmlr.com to get your hands on that new Macron gear for 2025, and remember to use code ‘MLRSTATS’ at checkout for 15% off your order!