BUFFALO, NY •The Gotham Knights, the gay rugby football club from the New York City area, will be in Buffalo on Saturday April 9, 2008 to participate in the North Eastern Division III Rugby Playoffs.
Gotham's Nuno Santos told Outcome "It's the gays vs. the straights & we'd love your support!
The Knights accomplished something that no other gay US rugby team has, placing second in the New York Metropolitan Division III league, and is now competing in the North Eastern Playoffs, the next step to the Division III National Championships.
Gotham's first playoff match is this Saturday, April 12, 2008, in Buffalo, against the South Buffalo Thugs.
The match starts at 1pm and will be at Cazenovia Park in South Buffalo in the area known as "The Bowl" behind the Casino, Cazenovia Pkwy & Abbott Rd.
For more info http://www.sbrfc.com/schedule/event.php?id=20
Gotham Knights RFC is New York's recent entry to the growing worldwide ranks of multi ethnic and non-discriminatory rugby teams worldwide. In 2000 Mark Bingham, who had played with the gay rugby team, the San Francisco Fog, met with New York City rugby player, Scott Glaessgen. They began steps to form a gay New York City team. Their plans were cut short on September 11th, 2001, when Mark was lost in a terrorist attack on United Airlines Flight 93 over rural Pennsylvania.
Inspired by Mark's life, work, and dedication to the sport of rugby led Scott and other New York City rugby players to meet in late 2001 to establish Gotham Knights RFC. Practice started in the cold, early months of 2002 under difficult pitch conditions, but within weeks the membership grew exponentially.
The Knights played the Washington, D.C. Renegades in April 2002 to play in their first ever match and later that spring played in the inaugural Mark Bingham Cup. Since then Gotham teams have played in the finals of the plate division at Bingham Cup II and London and in 2006 hosted Bingham Cup III, where their two sides finished fourth in the cup and plate divisions. They followed that up with their first ever multi-win season in the New York Met Union and their first ever overall winning season in the spring of 2007. Now into their seventh year of playing rugby, the team takes part in their first Division III playoff.
For more information about The Gotham City Knights Gotham Knights RFC
http://gothamrfc.org/ •Tim Moran
