Though not traditionally American like football or baseball, the sport of rugby is quickly making its way into popular culture.

The century-old sport has youth and adult clubs popping up all over the US—and one might even say “Invictus” is the new “Remember the Titans.”

The Arlington Heights area has a rugby club of its own, the Arlington Stallions. The club has three levels of competition for boys: high school varsity, high school freshman/sophomore and middle school.

Paul Bergman, one of the club’s founders and now president and head coach, said that the club began when a group of John Hersey High School sophomores decided they wanted to play and sought him out to help organize the group.

“The boys’ interest stemmed largely from their dads who had played rugby when they were younger,” Bergman said. “We decided we should organize ourselves into a club, and the rest is history.”

The club began as the Hersey Huskies in 2005, but the board of directors decided to change its name in 2007 to attract players from around the Arlington Heights area, Bergman said. Currently, many of the team’s kids come from Arlington Heights, Elk Grove Village, Rolling Meadows and Mount Prospect—but the club is not limited to specific suburbs, he said.

Bergman, who played rugby at Northern Illinos University and later with the Chicago Lions Rugby Club, has much experience in coaching the sport as well—such as with the Chicago Lions, the Chicago and Midwest-area Select Side and the Northwest Woodsmen Rugby Club. Bergman and his four other coaches work with the teams in weekly practices and throughout the spring.

The Stallions’ competitors come from clubs from Chicago and the surrounding area, such as: Brother Rice St. Charles, New Trier, Mount Carmel, Naperville, Oak Park/River Forest, Lake Forest, Elmwood Park and Montini Catholic.

In 2008, the Stallions introduced a middle school level of play. This year, for the first time, the club will include a freshman/sophomore team in addition to the varsity upperclassman team.

“We’re happy to have this opportunity to grow and give the younger high school-age kids a chance to compete at their own level,” Mike Peteras, the Stallions’ forward coach, said. “This team will act as a stepping stone to our upper-level high school team.”

The Stallions have been notably successful in recent years, going undefeated in the regular season in 2009 and sending a number of its players to the Illinois all-state rugby team, the Tornadoes. Both coaches said they want to produce a successful season, but they hope to the boys will get more than a winning record from the experience.

“Of course we’d ultimately like to win a state championship, but from a coaches’ perspective, that’s not our primary goal,” Bergman said. “We’re teaching the kids the sport of rugby. It takes a tremendous amount of physical conditioning—and it also is a team sport that gives the kids a chance to meet friends and have a positive experience.”

Peteras shared a similar sentiment and said the club is more focused on the entire rugby experience than the number of games won. For this season, in particular, Petaras said that he and the other coaches hope to help the players set personal goals.

“The kids usually only have their eyes set on winning a state championship, and we will certainly coach them to do that,” Petaras said. “But as coaches, its not always about winning. Our goal is to teach the boys the basics of rugby: running, tackling, passing and recycling. We hope to allow kids to learn the game despite their competitive side and desire to win. We want to make sure they have a good experience, learn from the game and have the chance to play at a higher level.”

When asked about including a girls team, Bergman said that if the interest was there, he would form a team.

“The topic has come up, but we haven’t had substantial interest,” he said. “But, if a large enough group of girls approached me with a real interest to play, we’d do our best to form a team.”

The Arlington Stallions begin regular season play around April 1 and play through the beginning of June. The club’s home field is at Busse Woods Forest Preserve in Schaumburg.

The club held a sign-up Jan. 10, but registration is still open for the next few weeks to new players who want to join a team, Bergman said.

For more information about the Stallions, visit the club’s Web site, www.arlingtonstallionsrugby.com.

—Story by Bridget Doyle, Triblocal.com reporter