The 1913 New Zealand tour rugby of North America was the second tour by the

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

national

rugby union Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its m ...

outside

Australasia Australasia is a region that comprises Australia, New Zealand and some neighbouring islands in the Pacific Ocean. The term is used in a number of different contexts, including geopolitically, physiogeographically, philologically, and ecologica ...

. Sixteen matches were played (all won) along with a Test match against United States sides. The tour had a relevance for American rugby because it came at a time when the local code,

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...

, was widely criticized prompted by worries over violent play, serious injuries and evidence of sharp practice by college coaches. That dispute, originated in 1906, had led some colleges (such as

Stanford Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is considere ...

and California, Berkeley Universities) to switch from football to rugby. The ''All Blacks'' (which had toured in North America for the first time in

1905 As the second year of the massive Russo-Japanese War begins, more than 100,000 die in the largest world battles of that era, and the war chaos leads to the 1905 Russian Revolution against Nicholas II of Russia (Shostakovich's 11th Symphony i ...

) had already made their contribution to the spread of the sport in the west coast. New Zealand took the tour seriously, with a squad led by veteran player Alex McDonald that won all their matches in North America with large victories, conceding only 6 points in 16 games. The only test was played against the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

, which included players from Stanford and Berkeley. The impact of such hard defeats induced a depression by the result, widely covered by the media which emphasized the big difference because Californian players and the New Zealand side. As a result, the University of California returned to football in 1915, although Stanford would remain in rugby, generating an extraordinary performance of the national team in the

1920 Events January * January 1 ** Polish–Soviet War in 1920: The Russian Red Army increases its troops along the Polish border from 4 divisions to 20. ** Kauniainen, completely surrounded by the city of Espoo, secedes from Espoo as its own ma ...

and

1924 Events January * January 12 – Gopinath Saha shoots Ernest Day, whom he has mistaken for Sir Charles Tegart, the police commissioner of Calcutta, and is arrested soon after. * January 20– 30 – Kuomintang in China hol ...

Olympic Games The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a var ...

, winning the gold medal in both occasions.The tour that killed American rugby
by Huw Richards on ESPN, 29 Oct 2013

Squad

Match summary

Complete list of matches played by the ''All Blacks'' in North America:Match centre - In North America
on AllBlacks.comNew Zealand Teams Overseas
An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand Test matches Stanford_univ_rugby_1913

Match details

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:1913 New Zealand Rugby Union Tour Of North America

New Zealand tour

tour Tour or Tours may refer to: Travel * Tourism, travel for pleasure * Tour of duty, a period of time spent in military service * Campus tour, a journey through a college or university's campus * Guided tour, a journey through a location, directed ...

Rugby union tours of the United States Rugby union tours of Canada New Zealand national rugby union team tours of North America 1913 in North American sport 1913 in American sports

Squad

Match summary

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See also

References