How Matthew Brooks ’24 became Wabash rugby’s captain
“Most guys say they grew up with a football in their hand– well I grew up with a rugby ball in my hands,” said Matthew Brooks ’24.
Now in his senior season as a member of the rugby club, Brooks is looked to as one of the leaders of the program after playing a major role in the team’s 2023 trip to the National Collegiate Rugby Championships, as well as his work to ensure the continued success of the program.
On the pitch, Matthew Brooks is a hook. His job is to do most of the dirty work and take most of the physical beating during a scrum and scoop the ball out to one of the faster wingers, who do most of the scoring. It is one of the most selfless positions in sports and that quality is reflected in how he approaches his life at Wabash.
Off the pitch, Brooks is a brother of Phi Gamma Delta (FIJI) and member of the Sphinx Club. He loves his membership to both brotherhoods, because they allow him to be there for “anyone who needs to talk.” The best word to describe him would have to be “sincere”.
Brooks grew up surrounded by rugby, as his family, hailing from South Africa, were close followers of the Springboks, a team in the South Africa national rugby union. He began playing organized rugby in the sixth grade when he joined a local club near Carmel.
“I finally found out that I could play rugby in Indiana, because I wanted to keep playing sports,” said Brooks. “That just kind of set me off on the path. It was the first time I played with tackling, but I already understood the game. I knew what the positions were and I knew how to pass the ball from growing up around it.”
Even before Wabash, Brooks saw what a successful rugby program looked like, when his club won a state championship during his freshman year of high school. While he was a reserve during games, it was the off-the-pitch team building that helped him continue to cultivate his love for the sport.
But after his senior year of high school was cut short by COVID-19, Brooks was uncertain as to whether he could continue playing rugby into his college years.
Brooks visited Wabash the summer after his senior year, thanks to the recommendation of several alumni, who “came of the woodwork” to encourage him to check out the College. His visit won him over, after it introduced him to two of key parts of his future Wabash experience embodied by one individual, Sam Anderson ’21, who was president of FIJI and a member of the rugby club at the time.
“I met Sam Anderson and realized the culture of the team was incredible,” said Brooks. “The hours are exactly how I wanted it to be in the afternoons. And it was just a lighthearted feel for the game. From then on, as soon as I got on campus [I knew] I was going to play and from there, it just kind of kept progressing.”
Brooks was not immediately able to play rugby, however, as the fall 2020 season was canceled due to the pandemic. But Brooks credits the semester as a key opportunity for him to adjust to life at Wabash.
“It really allowed me to adjust the campus, to pledgeship and to the academics here, so that was beneficial,” said Brooks. “And then spring of 2021 was my real first semester playing rugby.”
With a deep knowledge of the sport, Brooks quickly rose through the ranks of the rugby program, a transition that looks very different from the official varsity sports at Wabash.
“I had no real title, but I was helping set up cones before practice and tearing them down at the end and helping wash the jerseys,” said Brooks. “Little things like that were what I helped with — nothing that really seeks credit or acclaim. I was passionate about the sport and wanted to help the team out. Being in rugby again was huge for me, because I know it was hard having my senior year cut short.”
Without a coach, the Rugby players are responsible for almost all of the planning that goes into scheduling matches, whether that’s planning practices, signing up for tournaments, making travel arrangements or managing entry fees. The team has found a way to ease the burden by implementing a “solid leadership progression.”
By the time his junior year rolled around, Brooks, as treasurer of the club, was a key fixture of a team that was starting to realize they had all the pieces they needed for a truly special season.
Along with their growing popularity and upcoming leaders, the team had a star player in their president Brayden Goodnight ’23, who exemplified the most important piece of the puzzle — a team-first mentality.
“This story would be incomplete if I didn’t mention Brayden,” said Brooks. “Brayden was by far the most talented player we’ve ever had. He could score whenever wanted. But he didn’t, because he was selfless and he would do whatever was best for the team.”
The self-led team captured their first-ever conference title in the middle of a thunderstorm to secure a bid to the 2023 National Collegiate Rugby Championships in Washington D.C.
By the time the team got back from the conference tournament, a wave of generosity from alumni had swept in and covered the cost of traveling. A few weeks later the team was competing in nationals.
“This was our school’s first time ever going to Nationals,” said Brooks. “And we were the only team out of all of the different divisions to not have a full-time coach. That was kind of a nice little chip on our shoulder.”
After three excellent performances, the team finished third in the nation for Small College rugby. Brooks even scored his first collegiate try during the trip.
As the leader of the current team, Brooks is the keeper of the trophy that proves Wabash rugby really did it.
“Walking away with hardware [a trophy], actually having something physical that we could hold that showed that we accomplished something incredible, was huge,” said Brooks. “And getting back and all of a sudden professors who I don’t even know their names or what departments they are in knew us. That was something cool that I feel like only the bigger sports get, but this little club managed to do all of that.”
In his final season at Wabash, Brooks hopes to lead another group of younger rugby players to nationals. He plans to leave behind a legacy of selfless, team-first thinking and a strong brotherly bond that he learned from those before him and has characterized his time on the team.