Background & HIstory
Previously known as Rugby United New York (RUNY) from 2019-2021 and Rugby New York in 2022, The Rugby New York Ironworkers joined the league in 2019 as a part of the first wave of expansion alongside the Toronto Arrows. The Ironworkers won 1 MLR Championship, lifting the 2022 MLR Shield after defeating the Seattle Seawolves 30-15 in the Championship Game following a controversial final few weeks of the season that saw the Austin Gilgronis and LA Giltinis disqualified.
Rugby United New York was founded in April 2018 by James Kennedy of Murphy Kennedy Group, a New York construction management company. At some point the team was taken over by the Bolton group which injected significant New Zealand influence into the team, aiding the team’s playoff push and 2022 Championship win. Since after the 2022 season, rumblings had been going on that the Bolton group was attempting to sell the franchise to new ownership. It seems that they had a prospective buyer lined up but a deal never materialised. Shortly after the Toronto Arrows announced that they were withdrawing from the 2024 season, the club missed a capital call with the league and were granted a few days extension but no solution was found. On 6th December 2023 after hours of speculation and rumours, MLR announced that the Rugby New York Ironworkers would not compete in the 2024 season. The league had lost it’s entire 2019 expansion class within 10 days (although the Arrows were a founding member, they did not compete in 2018).
Records & Record Holders
2022 MLR Champions
all time
Top Scorer: Dylan Fawsitt (205pts)
Top Try Scorer: Dylan Fawsitt (41)
Top Playoff Scorer: Jason Emery (24pts)
Top Tackler: Nate Brakeley (842)
Top Meter Eater: Fa’asiu Fuatai (3,059m)
Most Capped Player: Dylan Fawsitt (72)
Most Starts: Dylan Fawsitt (65)
single season
Top Scorer: Dan Hollinshead (111pts) – 2021
Top Try Scorer: Dylan Fawsitt (13) – 2019
Top Tackler: Brendon O’Connor (238) – 2022
Top Meter Eater: Fa’asiu Fuatai (1,350m) – 2022
head coach & captain
Head Coach
- Mike Tolkin (2018-2019)
- Greg McWilliams (2020)
- Marty Veale (2021-2022)
- James Semple (2022-2023)
captain
- Mike Petri (2019)
- Dylan Fawsitt (2020-2021)
- Nate Brakeley (2022-2023)
historical performance
2019: 11-0-5 (+91) – 54pts: 4th (Semifinalist)
2020: 3-0-2 (+5) – 15pts: 4th in Eastern Conference
2021: 10-0-6 (+29) – 53pts: 2nd in Eastern Conference (Semifinalist)
2022: 11-0-5 (+25) – 56pts: 3rd in Eastern Conference (Champion x1)
2023: 8-0-8 (+41) – 43pts: 2nd in Eastern Conference (Conference Semifinalist)
Overall Regular Season Record: 43-0-26
Overall Championship Series Record: 3-2
Championship Series Appearances: 4 (2019, 2021. 2022, 2023)
Logo & Jersey
Bar the initial change from 2019 to 2020, the logo has only undergone a number of small changes almost annually. For MLR 2023, the moniker ‘Ironworkes’ was added to reflect the changing landscape of New York, as well as rugby in the USA, and also to recognise the workers who constructed the famous New York skyline.
The New York jersey began as a dark blue & orange ‘pinstripe’ design reminiscent of an old style baseball jersey. This chanced to a primarily dark blue jersey with orange accents for much of the team’s history. They did wear a brave bright orange away jersey for a time, but the team’s away jerseys tended to be primarily white with light blue accents. Each season from 2021-2023 the jerseys featured an iconic piece of New York, such as the Statue of Liberty or the Brooklyn Bridge, for example. New York have had a number of one-off jersey as well such as a primarily pink jersey, or a city edition jersey mimicking the New York subway system.
Venues
There have been issues in finding a stable home venue from year to year, in part due to the lack of top tier rugby facilities within the dense NYC area, and in part due to the cost of NY in general. Below is a list of NY home venues since they entered the league:
- MCU Park (Capacity 7,000): 2019-2020
- Cochrane Stadium (Capacity 4,000): 2021
- JFK Stadium (Capacity 1,000): 2022
- Memorial Stadium (Capacity 3,900): 2023
The team came under some scrutiny in 2022 for playing out of JFK Stadium, a high-school turf field that had a very small capacity because of it’s small footprint. The field was not licensed so couldn’t serve alcohol, and stray rugby balls would regularly fly over the fence to the neighboring children’s playground. There was even a number of viral moments about a rooftop at the end of the pitch, were fans would watch from that could regularly be seen on the live feeds. The team made the most of that experience, but moved to the far more appropriate Mount Vernon Memorial Stadium for 2023.
