In the world of college athletics, multi-sports athletes aren’t as rare as one would think. When, football players, for example, sign their letters of intent it’s usually for one sport. However, they might do another sport, such as track, because the training schedules don’t collide and it keeps them in shape.

For one Texas high school athlete, football simply wasn’t enough. Hailing from Nolan Catholic High in Fort Worth, TX; football standout Shane Garza will, according to reports from the Dallas Morning News and Yahoo Sports, be sporting University of British Columbia’s colors in both football and rugby.

Garza was a standout defensive end for a team that recently won their third Texas Association of Private and Parochial Schools title in four years. At college level, he is projected to play on the defensive line or go to linebacker. As for rugby, conventional wisdom would point towards the back line at outside centre or wing, but nothing is definite because his experience is limited.

Moreover, he will be just the fifth US native to join the Thunderbirds roster and certainly the first Texan. Putting that into perspective, there just as many international players on UBC’s 53-man roster from countries such as Australia and South Africa.

And while the bloodline is short in rugby, football is the confident guess as to why Garza went north of the border for athletics. His father, Sam, played quarterback at Texas-El Paso and later when onto the Canadian Football League playing for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and Ottawa Rough Riders.

Either way, Canada, and both football and rugby, has called, and Garza came running.