{"id":572555,"date":"2026-03-29T18:10:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-29T18:10:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/572555\/"},"modified":"2026-03-29T18:10:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T18:10:09","slug":"rugby-player-with-no-football-experience-commits-to-gamecocks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/572555\/","title":{"rendered":"Rugby player with no football experience commits to Gamecocks"},"content":{"rendered":"

LONDON — Neff Giwa, a 20-year-old Irishman who has never played American football, committed on Sunday to play at South Carolina<\/a> as an offensive lineman.<\/p>\n

Just a few months after showing an interest in the sport, Giwa, who is of Nigerian decent, said he was touring U.S. college campuses, meeting coaches and collecting offers. It’s a lot to handle, even for someone who is 6-foot-7\u00bd, weighs 295 pounds and has 37-inch-long arms and great foot speed.<\/p>\n

“I knew that there’d be a journey there, but I could never have anticipated this,” Giwa told The Associated Press about his recruitment.<\/p>\n

Giwa, whose full first name is Oluwanifemi, selected the Gamecocks over offers from Miami<\/a>, North Carolina<\/a>, SMU<\/a>, Tennessee<\/a> and Texas<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Oluwanifemi ‘Neff’ Giwa, an Irish rugby player with no experience playing American football, has committed to South Carolina. At 6-foot-7 1\/2 and 295 pounds, Giwa, who was clocked at 4.88 seconds in the 40-yard dash, is projected as an offensive lineman.\u00a0AP Photo\/Alastair Grant<\/p>\n

Giwa had two visits to South Carolina and said he spent “a lot of time” with coach Shane Beamer.<\/p>\n

He has been clocked at 4.88 seconds in the 40-yard dash, while his broad jump was measured at 9 feet, 10 inches.<\/p>\n

Giwa grew up in Cashel, a town in County Tipperary with a population under 5,000.<\/p>\n

His mother is a nurse and his father is a physiotherapist. Giwa, who has three older siblings, said they were the first Nigerian family to move into town and that local residents “definitely made us feel welcome.”<\/p>\n

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What does he tell everyone about college football and the facilities he has visited?<\/p>\n

“I tell them it’s a different world over there,” he said.<\/p>\n

Rugby, soccer, hurling and Gaelic football are the local sports.<\/p>\n

Giwa likes that American football allows him to use his size. He sees a rugby-to-football template in Jordan Mailata<\/a>, a 6-foot-8 Australian who plays offensive tackle for the Philadelphia Eagles<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Name, image and likeness deals allow college athletes, even international ones if done correctly, to earn big money.<\/p>\n

“It does make you think about possibilities and choices and how you can help others. [But] it’s more just making your family proud,” he said.<\/p>\n

The Associated Press contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LONDON — Neff Giwa, a 20-year-old Irishman who has never played American football, committed on Sunday to play…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":572556,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-572555","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572555","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=572555"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572555\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/572556"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=572555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=572555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=572555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}