New England Free Jacks

The New England Free Jacks are a professional rugby union team in Major League Rugby (MLR) based in the Greater Boston area. They were announced in September 2018 and began to compete professionally in October 2018. They competed in their first season in MLR in the 2020 season. On July 8, 2023, they became the MLR Champions for the 2023 season, after defeating San Diego Legion in a closely fought match.

History
On September 21, 2018, Major League Rugby announced that Boston would be one of the expansion teams joining the league for the 2020 season. That same day, the Boston club was announced as the New England Free Jacks through social media. Their first match was on October 20, 2018, against the Ontario Arrows at Wanderers Grounds in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Early rosters from these matches included a mixture of veteran professional players from the disbanded PRO Rugby competition and top local talent from clubs such as the Boston Irish Wolfhounds and Mystic River.

NFL players Nate Ebner and Patrick Chung are minority owners of the Free Jacks.

Roster
The New England Free Jacks squad for the 2024 Major League Rugby season is:


 * Senior 15s and senior 7s internationally capped players are listed in bold.
 * * denotes players qualified to play for the on dual nationality or residency grounds.
 * MLR teams are allowed to field up to ten overseas players per match.

Head coaches

 * 🇺🇸 Josh Smith (2018–2020)
 * 🇳🇿 Ryan Martin (2020–2021)
 * 🇿🇦 Scott Mathie (2021-present)

Captains

 * Josh Larsen (2020–present)

Leadership
Staff for 2022 Major League Rugby Season:

Owners

2019 season
All games in the 2019 season were exhibition games and did not count in the league standings; the team played to a record of 1–7, losing their first seven games and winning their final match of the season.

2020 season
On March 12, 2020, MLR announced the season would go on hiatus immediately for 30 days due to fears surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic. Seven days later, MLR announced that the season was officially cancelled. The Free Jacks finished the short season 9th in the MLR, 6th in the Eastern Conference.

Regular season
The team accrued a 1–4 record before the season was halted.

2021 season
The Free Jacks' first game of the 2021 season was played on March 20, facing LA Giltinis in Los Angeles.

Source:

Regular season
Source:

Mascot
On May 7, 2021, the Free Jacks announced a mascot, Woodgy, a furry blue creature with rugby headband tape who wears Free Jacks rugby kit.

New England Independents
On January 8, 2020, the Free Jacks announced that they would compete in two preseason matches against the New England Independents, a brand new select team of local All-Star talent representing eight clubs throughout New England. Adam Zilcoski, of the Boston Irish Wolfhounds, was selected as the head coach.

Roster
Squad for 2020 Major League Rugby Preseason:

Junior Jacks
The Junior Jacks are the youth academy level for the Free Jacks.