ATHABASCA – Students at Edwin Parr Composite School (EPC) had a chance to take on a new sport this year when Athabasca RCMP Const. David McLenaghan started up a rugby squad for the high school students.
McLenaghan, who’s in the middle of his first RCMP posting, said that he was proud of the 15 students for how quickly they picked up the sport, and for the consistent hard work and effort that they put into the season.
“We practiced for two hours a day Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and I was able to get in touch with other coaches to get the boys into a couple of tournaments,” said McLenaghan.
Part of the challenge was finding games to play as with no other teams in the area, the boys had to travel to get actual game experience, which is something that McLenaghan was dead set on providing.
“We went to St. Albert, Lloydminster, Edmonton and we travelled down to Drayton Valley. The boys probably played three to four games every tournament, so they got a decent amount of game time. You can practice all you want, but unless you play against other kids, you’re not going to see that competitive side of the game.”
Despite all being new to the sport, McLenaghan says that they did well, both in games, and in practice. Due to the size of the team, the boys played “sevens” which is a faster form of the game as rugby is typically played with 15 players, and 40-minute halves, whereas sevens still uses the same field, but plays two, seven-minute halves instead.
“The first couple of games were definitely rough; they didn’t lose by a lot, but they didn’t win much either,” said McLenaghan. “They were learning, and besides one Grade 11 student, the boys were Grade 9s and 10s, playing against schools that had much larger pools of athletes to pull from.”
Rugby has been a major part of McLenaghan’s life as he started playing in Grade 9 in small town New Brunswick and kept the sport up until he transferred to Athabasca with the Mounties.
“I’d still be playing now, but we don’t have a men’s team here,” he said.
Along the way, McLenaghan played in university, for and two provinces (the New Brunswick Black Spruce, and the Edmonton Gold) in the now defunct semi-pro Rugby Canada Super League.
Many of the things that made him a good rugby player have carried forward into his career in law enforcement — while he has only recently started with the RCMP, McLenaghan has also worked as a law enforcement officer with other branches, including time as a community peace officer.
“Teamwork is always a big one, as a police officer you’re always going to be working in a team. On the field, if a guy gets tackled, you need to be able to get there quickly, get over the ball and get it into the next phase of play. The same thing happens in the policing world; if you have a buddy or a co-worker that needs help, you need to get there and support your guys. Likewise, if someone is super busy and needs help with paperwork, you help them with that,” he said.
“Perseverance is another big one. It’s cliché, but when you get knocked down (in sports) you’ve got to get back up again, and it’s the same thing in the policing world. There’s days where you’re going to go to bad calls, or rough calls that will have an impact on you and on your life, and you need to get back up and keep going, same as on the rugby field.”
While the season is over, McLenaghan said they were also trying to get in contact with some coaches he knew from his playing days to set up a tour for the kids in Newfoundland.
“Being able to bring some of the stuff that I was lucky enough to experience to the community, and to try and get the kids the same chances would be the goal,” he said.
