The 2016 PRO Rugby season was the inaugural and only season of the PRO Rugby, contested by teams from the United States. The season ran from April to July 2016. This was the first season of professional rugby union in North America.
PRO Rugby contracted 102 players for its five teams. Of these 102 players, 54 have played international rugby, including 36 for the United States national rugby union team.[1] About 30 players were picked from Pacific Rugby Premiership teams and 15 from Midwest Rugby Premiership teams.[citation needed]
Competition format
Each team played a twelve match schedule with six matches at home and six away. Most matches took place on Sunday to give clubs and schools the chance to play on Saturday and Friday.[2]
The league had a lighter schedule on June 5 and 12 (the 12th being during the three-week June international window). Those days had just one match. There was however a full slate on June 19 and 26 (both during the international window) and teams lost players to the United States, Canadian or other national teams during this time.[2]
Broadcasting
Matches were available for the 2016 inaugural season to stream through prorugby.org or on cable through ONE World Sports or Time Warner Cable Sports Channel. Initially selected matches were available free to all online through www.aol.com but this came to an inexplicable abrupt end.[3] Through the league's official website all matches were streamed free to all viewers. ONE World Sports was offered by multiple cable and satellite providers and covered a range of sports, most notably a large selection of soccer.[4]
The table above shows a team's progression throughout the season. For each round, their cumulative points total is shown with the overall log position in brackets.
Key:
win
loss
draw
bye
Players
Note: Flags to the left of player names indicate national team as has been defined under World Rugby eligibility rules, or primary nationality for players who have not yet earned international senior caps.
