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Patrick Oglesbee grew up in the rural community of Glennville, Georgia, where hunting and fishing were a way of life and satisfying pastimes.
Emosi Bainivalu grew up on the rural, volcanic Fijian island of Taveuni where he fished and hunted wild chickens and boars.
Both boys were raised half a world apart. Both would eventually join the Army and play on the same rugby team.
This week, they played on the Army team, with matches against four of the other service teams at the Armed Forces Men’s Rugby Championship. Their team captured gold during the championship match in Glendale, Colorado, on Saturday.
Oglesbee had dreamed of going to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York. He studied hard and was accepted, receiving his second lieutenant commission in May.
A good fit for team Army, Oglesbee scored a hat trick against the Marine Corps team on Friday, the first day of the matches. A hat trick is when a rugby player scores at least three tries in a game. A try is the rugby equivalent of a touchdown in football.
When asked how he prepares himself for rugby matches, Oglesbee said that besides working out and thinking strategically, he always says a prayer and “leaves everything in the hands of God.”
Oglesbee is stationed at West Point, where he works in the academy’s athletic department. Later, he will go to job training in the communications field.
Bainivalu won the green card lottery in 2012, which is a U.S. government program that provides a limited number of visas to applicants from countries with low immigration rates with the goal of creating a more diverse U.S. society.
After arriving in the United States in 2014, he decided to enlist in the Army in 2016 and began playing rugby in the All-Army Sports Program in 2017.
Besides being in excellent physical shape, Bainivalu said he plays every match as if it were the championship match, never easing up or letting his guard down.
About once every three years, he returns to Taveuni to visit his parents and other relatives and to ride his three horses.
Army Sgt. Bainivalu is a motor transport mechanic based at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington. He’s been deployed to Thailand and the Philippines as part of Exercise Cobra Gold. He also deployed to South Korea for nine months.
