Women's Clubs

Georgia rugby is a small world. Everyone has coached against everyone, the good ones get known early, and for years the hardest question in the sport here has been the one that comes after high school: now where does she actually go to keep playing? More often than the state would like, the answer has been somewhere else.

Wesleyan College wants to be the answer that keeps her home.

The college in Macon, founded in 1836 as the first in the world chartered to grant degrees to women, is building a women's varsity rugby program from scratch, with a first season set for the fall of 2027. It is coached by Christopher Parks, it will be called the Wolves like everything else in Wesleyan's athletics, and it arrives with something Georgia has been short on for women's college rugby: real money.

Here is why that last part matters. Wesleyan moved to the NAIA in July 2026, and for the first time in the school's long history it can offer athletic scholarships. Parks intends to spend them at home. His whole pitch is built around Georgia high-schoolers, the exact players who have been aging out of a strong youth scene with nowhere in-state to land.

We sent Coach Parks six questions, about the plan, the money, and what year one looks like if you have never touched a rugby ball. His answers, lightly edited, are below.

The Rugby Radar: Who do you actually play, sevens or fifteens, and when does the first real season kick off?

Christopher Parks: We're officially kicking off our inaugural season in the fall of 2027, joining National Collegiate Rugby and competing in the South Atlantic Rugby Conference. That gives our athletes a genuinely competitive framework right out of the gate. Our baseline goal is to field a high-performance sevens roster. It's the fastest way to build skill, keep engagement high, and be tournament-ready, especially as we bring crossover athletes up to speed. But there's no ceiling on roster size. Our recruiting is aggressively targeting incoming high-school seniors, and if our numbers allow, we're fully prepared to step onto the pitch as a fifteens squad in the fall of 2027 as well. We're laying the foundation for a legacy fifteens program and we're ready to scale the moment we hit critical mass.

The Rugby Radar: Tuition runs $26,450 and academic awards cover a chunk of that automatically. What does the athletic scholarship add on top, and how close to zero can a Georgia recruit really get?

Christopher Parks: Wesleyan's tuition is a strong value at $26,450, and the automatic academic merit scholarships are a phenomenal starting point. Because we're an NAIA program, we can stack athletic rugby awards directly on top of that academic money. For our Georgia recruits, when you combine the athletic scholarship, academic awards, federal aid, and state programs like HOPE or Zell Miller alongside the Georgia Tuition Equalization Grant, the out-of-pocket cost drops dramatically. For students who qualify, the strongest combinations can reduce the remaining cost to zero. It's a genuinely affordable path to a private-college education right here in Macon.

The Rugby Radar: What's your pitch to a player who'd otherwise go play club at UGA or Georgia Tech?

Christopher Parks: Georgia is the cornerstone of our recruiting. There's incredible athletic talent in this state and building a pipeline here is a priority. We have real respect for the club programs at UGA and Georgia Tech. They have long histories and give players a great environment. But my pitch to a senior deciding between Wesleyan and a club program at a bigger school comes down to the varsity experience. At Wesleyan you aren't joining a student-run club. You're stepping into a fully supported varsity program, with stackable athletic and academic scholarships, dedicated strength and conditioning, and comprehensive athletic training. And you get to be a founding member of it. You won't just play on a team. You'll help build one.

The Rugby Radar: Some of your recruits will have never played a minute of rugby. What does year one look like for a total beginner, and what's the coverage on training and injury care?

Christopher Parks: For a crossover athlete stepping onto the pitch for the first time, year one is built entirely around beginner-friendly sevens coaching, with progressive, low-contact and no-contact practice plans focused on the fundamentals: open-field passing, tracking, creating space, and high-cardio fitness. I break the laws down into simple, universal language so an absolute beginner can process the game quickly and play fast. And because we're a fully supported varsity program, our athletes have comprehensive coverage from our athletic training staff, with injury prevention, baseline testing and recovery protocols built into the weekly schedule, so the introduction to contact is safe and supported.

The Rugby Radar: Where is this program in three years, and what would have to go wrong for it not to work?

Christopher Parks: In three years we'll have transitioned our experienced sevens roster into a competitive fifteens program. The one thing that could slow us down is player burnout, which is why retention matters to us as much as recruiting. We're building a tight-knit culture that prioritizes the athlete's well-being. Manageable training loads, personalized mentorship, and an encouraging environment keep our founding players healthy, graduating together, and leading the next wave of recruits.

The Rugby Radar: Does the team have a social handle yet?

Christopher Parks: The program's presence runs through the school's athletic department at @wesleyan_athletics. I also keep a coach's account with frequent updates at @coachchris_wolvesrugby.

The first whistle is two seasons away, but the recruiting is live right now, which means the players this affects are in high-school gyms and on club pitches across the state this fall. If that's your daughter, your athlete, or you, Macon is worth the drive. Follow the build at @wesleyan_athletics and @coachchris_wolvesrugby. And if your program has news the rest of Georgia rugby should hear, the Radar is listening.