Jaime Madore remembers watching Abby Vogel play rugby for the high school team of the Portland Women’s Rugby Football Club a few years back.

“She was impressive in how strong she was,” said Madore, the coach of the women’s club. “There weren’t too many girls who could stop her. She’d start running and it would take three, four girls to stop her.

“It was fun watching that.”

Vogel, a 2013 Yarmouth High graduate, hasn’t stopped running since.

Not only is Vogel playing in college – she is a sophomore on the University of California’s club team – but she is also a member of the U.S. under-20 national team that recently competed in a tournament in Canada.

Danielle Miller, the U.S. coach, said it is rare for a Mainer to advance this far in rugby. Ally Day of Gorham was selected to be on the U.S. U-17 national team four years ago. Day is now one of four Mainers playing rugby at Norwich University in Vermont.

“There is just not a lot of high school participation in rugby in Maine,” said Miller. “The development other kids might get from playing in high school – kids from Maine just don’t get it.”

In fact, there’s not a lot of high school participation in rugby anywhere in the United States. According to the National Federation of State High School Association’s 2013-14 participation survey, only two states offer high school girls’ rugby: California (14 schools, 289 participants) and Vermont (two schools, 33 competitors).

Vogel’s development likely came from other sports. She played football through the sixth grade, learning to appreciate the contact. She also skied and ran track at Yarmouth, developing the strong leg muscles that put her on the fast track in rugby.

“Really,” said Vogel, “I just really liked to play contact sports when I was growing up. When I got to high school, I learned about the local girls’ (rugby) team and played with them. It just exploded from there.”

Vogel not only played on the local high school girls’ rugby team – called the Super Sows – but also with the Portland women’s club. That’s when Madore first realized Vogel might be something special.

“It is rare for a high school girl to come up to play with the women,” said Madore, who coached Vogel on both teams. “For one thing there’s a safety concern. The women are playing at a much higher level and we didn’t know if the high school girls could come up and play safely and contribute.

“There’s also a maturity thing. Not all high school girls can hang out with adults and feel comfortable and confident.”

Vogel, 19, showed she had the talent, game sense and field vision to play with the adults. And she got better each year.

“When you’re 15 and competing against women who are as skilled as some of the current national team members, when you’re competing against players who are physically larger than I was,” Vogel said, “that helped me exponentially grow my skills.”

But both Madore and Miller, the U.S. national coach, said Vogel has something that makes her different from players of similar skill.

“Anyone who has ever met her knows she is an amazing person and player,” said Madore. “She had this great attitude and she was a hard worker and she’s all those cliche things that people say.”

Miller agreed that Vogel’s attitude separated her from other players.

“Abby was a fantastic player for us (in the tournament),” said Miller. “She has a great positive attitude and a great work ethic. She created something for the team that not everybody has. She has that little something special.

“She always has a smile on her face. She’s someone that everybody wanted to be a part of.”

Vogel, who played in the national high school All-America game last year, is back in Berkeley, California, getting ready to play for the Golden Bears in the competitive Pacific Mountain D1 Conference.

She plays tighthead prop, a power position that takes full advantage of her strong legs. Miller likened it to a lineman position in football.

“She’s in the scrum, in the front row,” said Madore. “That’s where you want to put your stronger players.”

Madore saw Vogel recently when Vogel came back to Maine and was impressed. “You can see she’s getting more and more fit, more and more confident,” said Madore.

That’s because Vogel has lofty goals:

“I want to play for the national team some day,” she said. “That’s the goal. I’ll keep working upon my skills. I’ll keep working on the path that I’m on.”

Miller likes to hear that.

“She is on the right path,” said Miller. “She’s in a competitive college program. She needs to continue training and competing in as many international events as possible.

“My goal for her is to continue to develop so she can continue playing internationally for the next 10 years or more.”

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