Building Champions
The Legacy of Steve Rains and the Bournemouth University Bobcats
The British American football scene has seen rapid growth over recent years, many changes to league structures, improvement of media coverage and much more. One integral influence on the scene, however, has remained consistent; Steve Rains.
Steve Rains recalled the moment he first fell in love with the game; he spoke of his brother “pestering” him until he gave in to watching an NFL game on TV, and the journey from not understanding what was going on all the way to “catching the football bug” and becoming a dedicated fan of the game.
Coach Rains began his coaching career as an assistant for the Wight Rhinos of the Isle of Wight in 1985. Rains moved on from the team in 1987, where became special-teams co-ordinator for the Farnham Knights.
After taking some time to learn the game from the more experienced coaches in the game, Rains returned to the Rhinos in 1991, before a successful season as offensive co-ordinator saw him gain promotion to his first head coaching role in ’92. Not only was this his first head coaching role, his first conference championship, claiming the BSL Southern Conference Division 2 title.
The following decades would see Coach Rains bouncing from team to team, championship game to championship game, accolade to accolade, collecting eight conference championships, three national championships, international head coaching roles and much more.
This period would include a top-tier National Championship win with the Knights in 2005;
"You always remember those championships with great affection. Particularly this one because not many teams outside of London or the North ever get to say they’ve done that, and capturing that while ending the [London] Olympians’ run of seven straight was great"
After relocating to the south coast, Coach Rains undertook his next challenge; the Solent Thrashers. Following back-to-back playoff seasons, the Thrashers went all the way in 2019; Rains took Solent on a rampage through the South, going undefeated in the regular season before carrying their momentum into the playoffs and winning out, beating the Sandwell Steelers in a game that was decided in the last 60 seconds by a Thrashers score.
Not only did this mark Coach Rains’ most recent championship, as well as promotion to the Premiere South Division, but it marked the start of a new journey.
After spending time coaching in Solent over the past summers, Coach Rains formed coaching relationships with players such as running back Titi Geas, who spent time playing semi-professionally for the aforementioned Raiders, and quarterback Luke Marder (who went on to coach alongside Rains after graduating).
Along with a few others, Rains mentioned these names as part of the influences to his joining of the Bournemouth University Bobcats, who were a decently established Division 2 side in the BUCS University league. Years prior, however, the Bobcats were nothing more than a society of some NFL fans playing after university for fun; Luke Marder recalled memories of the early Bobcats days – he spoke of wearing “Primark shirts as game jerseys, and barely getting enough people to field a team”. Ten years on, the Bobcats have come on leaps and bounds, thanks in part to Steve Rains.
One of the main changes he introduced was his and other coaches’ commitment to the team.
“When I first joined they had student-led training on a Wednesday, student-led chalk sessions on a Thursday, and the coaches would lead sessions on Sundays, so I said that myself and the coaches were available to coach mid-week, so if we commit to four sessions, are the players going to commit to four sessions? Which I think was one of the biggest factors in our success.”
“Not making sure we’re ready, making sure we are more ready than the other team”. This was Steve Rains’ philosophy in his opening seasons as a Bobcats coach and is a phrase he still calls on to this day.
“We’re all in the same boat. In a way, it’s one of the reasons I love being involved at the university level, because there is such a small turnaround between the start of the year in September and the first game in October. You live or die by whoever walks through the door.”
Being ‘more ready’ couldn’t have been a more relevant philosophy in the 2021/22 season.
Coach Rains spoke of his concerns at the start of the season, when the team travelled to Brighton for a pre-season scrimmage just a week after getting people kitted up for, in a lot of cases, the first time in their lives.
The season opener saw the Bobcats take home a 38-0 away win against the Bath Spa Bulldogs, giving them a lot of confidence going into the season, which they carried through, going undefeated all year and winning promotion with a huge win over Greenwich in the South Final.
“We played them away in the final being big underdogs, but we handled it quite comfortably. I think it was such a great moment also because of the great support we got from Team BU and the rest of the university teams. We travelled all the way to Greenwich, and had more support on our side-line than Greenwich had on theirs. The Greenwich players came up to me after the game and said it actually felt like an away game”.
The team would go on to have a successful campaign in 2023, seeing them reach the Division 1 South final before falling to Portsmouth.
Coach Rains’ philosophies have clearly had a huge impact on his players and how they experience the game, particularly offensive captain Aaron Taylor. Taylor spoke about the impact the coaches have had on the players’ view of themselves:
“A lot of people externally will think that we’ve exceeded our expectations, but we’ve always backed ourselves as a great team with great coaches and a great university backing us. I wouldn’t say it’s expected because nothing’s given to you in sports, but you reap what you sow”
The growth from a university society to one of the best teams in Division 1, and a team that recorded almost a two-calendar year win streak under Coach Rains, will remain one of the best stories in British American football.
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