Jacksonville Rugby Football Club (Jacksonville RFC), known as the Ospreys, are a men's rugby union

Rugby union

Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...

 team based in Jacksonville, Florida

Jacksonville, Florida

Jacksonville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Florida in terms of both population and land area, and the largest city by area in the contiguous United States. It is the county seat of Duval County, with which the city government consolidated in 1968...

. They are members of the Florida Rugby Union, the organizational body for rugby in the state of Florida

Florida

Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...

, and currently play in USA Rugby

USA Rugby

USA Rugby is the national governing body for the sport of rugby union in the United States. It is divided into seven territorial Unions: Mid-Atlantic, Midwest, Northeast, Pacific Coast, Southern California, South, and West...

 Division II. The club was founded in 1972.

History

Jacksonville RFC was founded in 1972. The original roster largely consisted of former college rugby players and a handful of locals. Among their biggest events in the early years was playing in front of 50,000 spectators as part of the events surrounding the 1989 Gator Bowl

Gator Bowl

The Gator Bowl is an annual college football bowl game played at EverBank Field in Jacksonville, Florida. Held continuously since 1946, it is the sixth oldest college bowl, as well as the first one ever televised nationally...

. After years of sporadic success, the team established itself in the 1990s under a string of British coaches, winning the 1996 state championship and going to the national championship. More recently they have made the Florida Cup finals, won the Florida matrix, and played in the National Final 8. In 2008 they won the USA Rugby South

USA Rugby South

The USA Rugby South is the Territorial Union for rugby union teams playing in the Southern United States. It is one of seven TU's that govern specific regions of USA Rugby.-LAU's:...

Division II Championship, and played in the national Final 16, ultimately finishing sixth in the country out of the 1,300 Division II teams.

The team currently plays its home matches at Davis Park in Jacksonville. The team president is Tim Stouder; the head coach is Ricky Braun.