Q&A: Justin Hickey on U20s and Clemson

Justin Hickey just concluded another stint as manager with the USA U20s. He’s also the head coach at Clemson where the team finished second to Maryland this past spring in the Atlantic Coast Rugby League.  I was able to take some time and talk to him about how both programs compare.

MT: What was your role with the U20s?
JH: I was the manager. For the last two years I handled the logistics including player and staff travel. A lot of behind the scenes stuff, setting up the training facilities, lodging, meals, transportation on the ground, and any other daily operations. The way we kinda look at it as a staff is we’re always out in from of the mothership as their in their own individual boats plowing away for the team. We’re taking care of any unexpected issues or obstacles that get in our way throughout the day. Basically just making sure that regardless of what comes up, if something falls through, something throws a wrinkle in our plans, as long as the team feels comfortable and their plans don’t really change, we feel like we’re doing a good job. A big part of it is waking up everyday and getting out in front of the day, the team, the operation. We literally might head to the training pitch ten minutes early and make sure no one’s there and there are no issues. So by the time the bus shows up, we don’t have a lot of idle time with the team. A big part of it is just making sure the whole organization of the staff and the players just stays on track.

MT: Would you say you’re the manager for Clemson in addition to coaching there?
JH: Absolutely. That’s a big part of it. I get the question a lot, “Do you enjoy being the manager? Seems like it would be a pain.” To be honest, I think I’d almost prefer it if I’m not head coach. I think I’d prefer to be a manager because it’s the closest thing.  A major thing of what I do at Clemson is just manage the program organizationally. I do more coaching here than obviously with the USA because my staff is much smaller. I’m much more involved with the training sessions and the things we do on the field. But I do try to put my other coaches into more of a training role so I can oversee the sessions and step back a little bit. But like I said, with the little bit smaller staff I tend to be in the trenches a little more. Definitely a dual head coach and manager role.

MT: Give us a rundown of the U20s staff.
JH: We had just about seven total core staff with us throughout the year with the U20s.  Myself, obviously (head coach) Scott Lawrence, Gavin Hickie took over mid-season for Luke Gross as the forwards coach, as you probably know the additional responsibilities Luke has picked up. So he was kinda forced to step back from coaching with the team but he’s still involved with the management of the age grade programs. Jason Kelly has been with us for a couple years as backs coach.  We brought in Vaha Esikia as a skills and defensive coach.  He was with us basically the full year from January. Justin Goonan, strength and conditioning coach, as been with us for two full years now. Ben Cowin, the trainer and now chiropractor, has been with the staff since we took on the High School All-Americans program, so three years now. That’s been our core staff going into the camps and everything we’ve done over the course of the year.  Just to get a different set of eyeballs and give a difference voice to things, we brought in Matt Huckaby and Alex Houser, both from Arkansas State.  They helped with the camp in at Atlanta.  We brought Matt back to the Olympic Training Center in April, over Easter weekend.  When we were in San Francisco, that was the first time we brought in Vaha and we decided to keep him on. We weren’t really able to get on the same schedule as Mike Diamantopoulos who did our video analysis last year.  He worked remotely for us quite a bit but it was hard for us to get him into camps.  So we brought in James Walton to Salt Lake City. He’s a kiwi and does video analysis professionally in New Zealand for a number of NPC teams and actually came over and did a season with Life, so that’s the connection there.  He came in for us for the Salt Lake trip. When we go into competition, USA Rugby supplies team doctors. So we had Sam Akhavan join us for the trip and his fellow came for a few days.  Both out of Pittsburgh.

MT: How about the Clemson staff?
JH: At Clemson, when I first took the job, I replaced Wright Henry who was a long serving head coach. He stepped aside for family and professional reasons as he owns a business here in town and has since had a second kid. He had to step away from responsibilities as for a while, it was just him on his own with the team. In the interim, Adam Rapp, a young professor on campus, Penn State grad, stepped up and took the team for the fall before I came down. I got down in January and actually both of those guys reached out to me with an interest in helping out and joining the staff. At first I wasn’t really sure. I thought it would kinda just be me by myself for a little while. I sat down with both of them and made sure we were on the same page on where I thought the program was going and where I wanted to take it while being sensitive to what they had done over the years.  We discussed some things I wanted to change and implementing a new culture and they were both on board. So we brought them both in spring 2011. It ended up being a really nice fit. I got along with both of them really really well. They both had more experience with coaching the forwards, so they spent time with the forwards while I spent time with the backs. It ended up being a good staff and they both provided their own unique personality to the team. It worked out really well. Adam Rapp took a job with the University of Alabama where he’s teaching now. We lost him going into the fall. Wright stayed on with us and a young recent grad, Thomas Martin came on with the staff. We had him working with the forwards in the fall. Scott McDonald (of Life University) came up and did an internship with us and got college credit for it. He did most of the strength and conditioning. The weight club here on campus has their own gym, a former football weight room. We work out there where players have twenty-four hour access. So we kinda had our own setup where Scott would take groups of forwards or the backs as a group in addition to one on one sessions between class. He would also do a lot of front row, warm-up, and recovery stuff at trainings. He brought a really nice high performance feel to the program that we hadn’t had before. It was really, really good to have him. He went back to Life for the spring. We had Thomas and Wright throughout the spring. I would step in and take on some of the warm-up stuff in Scottie’s place. We didn’t do a whole lot of strength and conditioning in the spring. It was kind of a rest from that. That’s how our staff is made up.

This year we’re adding a full time trainer for the first time. The school hired a trainer for Club Sports last year. We thought it was a pretty good step but it wasn’t really what we were looking for. She was overwhelmed by the number of teams. We found that guys would go to see her on a Monday and told to make an appointment for Friday. It turned into more of a nurse than a trainer. We were looking to do our own thing while at the same time letting Club Sports know that we want to work with them but if we have to do this on our own, we will. Finally, this summer, they had hired a grad assistant to help out for all of the teams. Apparently the process had gone well enough that they were open to us hiring a full time grad assistant through the university, but funded by the rugby program. We’ll be funding the position but they’ll be a masters student and certified trainer employed by the university. So that’s a pretty big step for us. A major, major addition to the staff. And the university is in the process right now of building a treatment room. So there will be a training office and a pretty big training room with recovery plunge tubs, treatment tables, taping tables, and a little bit of an area for therapy. A huge step forward for us that we’re excited about.

MT: Where does the money come from to pay for a trainer?
JH: We have an alumni foundation called the Clemson Rugby Foundation. It was established in 2007. Some of their major goals have been to create a scholarship fund, before USA Rugby put their supplemental insurance in place that was another objective, to generate funding for additional health insurance and catastrophic injuries, funding for a trainer, funding for a coach. So when they brought me in, that was a big piece of their strategic plan. Now with the trainer, that’s an additional piece for them. They basically just do annual fundraisers through their alumni base and take donations.  They provide different levels of donorship. They’ve done a pretty good job of building it year after year and the base has grown pretty well. They took the challenge when I had to go to them and they agreed to it, knowing they would pay for it, and basically said, “We’ll make it happen.” Like I said, it’s one of their major objectives. We put it on their desk and it’s their major challenge to raise the money.

MT: How many players do you have at Clemson and how many were in the U20s assembly?
JH: We had a roster of about 40-45 last year. But you know how it goes, the most we traveled with was 37, the least was probably about 32. We felt pretty good and pretty healthy with about 35 guys last year which has been an increase over previous years before I got here. I think going into this year we’ll be about the same. We’re getting in more freshman than we’re losing seniors so we’ll expect to be about 40. Over the year, we had four in in the U20s camps. Three of the four were identified at the regional all-star tournaments in the summer which is how many of the first campers are identified. Two of the four I had recommended. Three of the four are 1993’s so they’ll be eligible again next year. None of them were on the final U20s roster.

MT: Take us through a typical Clemson week.
JH: Pre-season obviously looks a little bit different from the regular season.  Pre-season we’ll use five or six days. We’ll use them for training and fitness and a full body of work.  When we get to the season, it typically turns into Monday through Friday with Monday primarily being film and if not film some kind of recovery session or we’ll take them to the gym. Tuesday through Thursday are our main on field training days. Hardly ever in the season, I don’t think we’ve ever, gone more than 90 minutes. Friday before the game, though we tend to play a lot of Friday night games with football, we’ll do a true captains run. Early in the season, we’ll do one or two things that I want to touch on. Otherwise I basically kinda sit back and let the captain run it. It can be as short as 20 minutes or an hour depending on how much the captain thinks we need to get done. Once we get into a rhythm, I’ll try to throw in an off day on a Monday or a Wednesday or even Friday depending. We have a five day a week schedule but we like to mix in days off throughout the season. Being a student myself now I get to see the academic load and understand, ok, this is a major exam week because guys are probably missing anyways. Maybe take Monday so guys have an extra day to study. They’re always committed to the five days but we try to mix in some breaks.

MT: What stuff did you do with the U20s that you’re not able to do at this point with Clemson?
JH: I’d say the biggest challenge is probably the strength and conditioning components. Before now, the access to athletic trainers. Those kind of recovery things. Especially in the summer time. I don’t want to spend a ton of time on fitness in the season. Time is obviously precious so you want to get straight into training. We try to put a lot on individuals to do strength and conditioning and fitness. You know how it is difficult for anybody to do and difficult for a coach to kinda hand it off and rely on them to do it. That’s probably the most challenging, to find time or ways to implement that stuff. We try to do a lot of the same stuff where we are supplementing protein after games or Gatorade at games, where we’ll do it just on Saturdays at Clemson or maybe we can do a team dinner a couple times during the season a couple days before. Where the ideal national team environment is protein after every training, Gatorade at everyone and plenty of fluid throughout. It’s the ideal situation and we can’t quite, because of money, can’t afford to go that far at Clemson but we try to piece it in here and there. We hope that some of the guys will get in the habit of taking care of themselves on their own. Otherwise, there are a lot of the same things we try to do like educating the guys in terms of nutrition. When we give the guys something, we really try to tell the guys why. Not because I say so or because we want you to do this or that. Everything we do has a reason and we take a lot of those pieces from what we do at the USA camp.

MT: Touching on that, in terms of the actual coaching, are you doing basically the same stuff at both places?
JH:  A lot of the same stuff. I think one of the most surprising things for coaches to see at a national team assembly, at any level, if you walk into Coach Tolkin’s training session or Salty Thompson’s training session, you’ll see a lot of the same stuff.  I know it’s cliche, but it’s all basic fundamental stuff. I think what I picked up the most and what I hammer the most at Clemson is a breakdown work. Offensively and defensively. And basic defensive work. I think it’s overlooked by a lot of coaches. We get caught up in training their skills and developing them individually. There’s never enough time in the day to make everybody you have a skilled, good rugby player. But if you can focus on the breakdown, focus on winning the ball, retaining possession, and defend well, keep your opponent from scoring, all the rest of this stuff is icing on the cake. Most of the kids you have are at least gonna be fairly athletic and intelligent enough that once they get the ball in the open they are gonna make good things happen. But if you can drill the breakdown, be efficient and solid there, and on defense as well, good things are gonna happen. I think that’s what we take away most from the national team camp, is the work on the floor. It’s crazy to see, it sounds like such a basic thing, the evolution even in the last couple years of some of the things we’re doing at the ruck. Something as simple as what the ball carrier does in contact, fight forward, fall on the ground, or how they present the ball, small little things like that make a world of difference.

MT: So the U20s were obviously pretty successful this year, as was your Clemson team. Were there some similarities in what made them both successful?
JH: I think so. I think you kinda touched on it a little bit and I think some people know. For the U20s we had a real successful tour in Canada and we were talking about it throughout the tour and really talking about it on the boat ride back from Canada. We sat as a coaching staff and talked about how can we make sure we don’t lose this momentum, how can we capture this. We had really, two weeks between Canada and the start of the Junior World Trophy. It was a really important two weeks especially for us as a staff to get home, spend some time with the family, pack and head back out on the road again. We kinda talked about it and said, “We gotta keep these guys back together. We gotta keep them training.” It kinda started with let’s get one or two into Denver, let’s get three or four, next thing we knew, we were asking 18-20 guys to get to Denver the week before we assembled. We started pulling guys one by one on the boat if they could do it. We ended up with 18 going in early. We were immediately on the phone looking for families to host them, working on the logistics of how are we gonna get these guys around. Literally, booking their flights only two days before to get them in. The response was great from the guys. They wanted to do it. Like normal rugby guys, just came in and crashed on couches. Holed up in one hotel room with 12 dudes all day just kinda watching TV and hanging out between training sessions. Piling them into vans and whatever cars we had to get around. I think they used buses to get back and forth sometimes to their host homes. It wasn’t even so much about the team training as it was about getting them there together, monitoring their diet, getting them up and doing the training sessions. They ran at Red Rocks one day, Mt. Sanitas another, all sorts of individual stuff and recovery stuff, in the river, really just kinda more team building and bonding than anything. The staff commitment showed that they were willing to take the next step and make the sacrifice of giving up, really, their only couple true weeks out of summer. Because most of these guys were just finishing up school, taking exams in Canada, more exams to be in Colorado. The team coming in and going up to Steamboat the week before was more of the same. Cooking our own food and cleaning the cabin ourselves, you know Real World style. Bodies all over the place, beds for everybody, but one big house where there’s really no separation from each other for the week. Like I said, kind of an extension from that.

But you see a lot of the same with what the guys are doing at Clemson. The team made the decision themselves to go from a two day a week training where they were struggling for numbers where they were getting half a dozen guys to some training sessions to a five day a week schedule. Like I said, seeing the inside of the academic work this year, I understand the commitment that it is for these guys to go from class to training five days a week. I never hear these guys complain. I throw things at them like weekend mini-camps. We try not but traveling on football home game weekends, fitness, and other things we throw at them. I never heard them complain. The team is definitely similar. I look at not only the sacrifice with school but the sacrifice with family, friends, that these guys are making for the team. Last year, we went from start of school in August, straight through basically right up before Thanskgiving, I don’t think we had a weekend off. We got back to school a little after new year we had a weekend camp, straight through the week before graduation and finals. No weekend off, or the only weekend off ended up being a makeup game. So these guys are pretty much giving up a weekend for the entire academic year. I’m trying to cut back this year with sevens being the focus this fall. The idea behind being to spread things out with a tournament every other weekend where they have that week off. They know they have one full weekend every month to commit too. It’s kind of a big commitment for kids that aren’t getting anything out of it other than the satisfaction of success and being on a team. It’s not paying for their tuition, it’s not paying them back in any other way really. It definitely takes a special commitment at any level to succeed and if you want to succeed, there has to be a lot of sacrifice.

MT: Last question, what’s unique about Clemson in the American collegiate rugby scene?
JH: That’s a tough one. I think there’s a lot of things that make Clemson kind of common I would say. There are so many programs that are facing the same challenges with high academic standards, general university guidelines and regulations. When you are trying to elevate the team’s status on campus, there are a number of teams that feel as if they are getting kicked back as well. I think what has made us unique is really our approach. When I got here and I was working with a couple former coaches and I said, “We’re gonna do this and we’re gonna do this technically and philosophically.” They kind of looked at me like, we’re not ready for that, you’re out of your mind, it’s never gonna happen. But we stuck to it. As a staff we continue to say and as a team we continue to say, “We’re gonna set the bar high.” If we don’t get it, at least we’re raising our game. But we’re not gonna set it here because it’s realistic and it’s what we think we can do. We continue to raise it, raise it, raise it and push these guys. Like I said, it might be technically what we are doing out on the field or just our approach. We push and push and push and I think that’s how you grow as a program and grow as a team. Not to fault anybody, it’s easy to look at your program if you are a part of one of these college programs and say, “OK, here’s all of my limitations, here’s what we can do.” And kind of get lulled into, “We’re just kinda gonna deal with it and face reality because this is what we got.” I think what sets teams apart is constantly pushing the envelope and raising the standard. That determines the success I believe.

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