Ruahei Demant

Devon Ruahei Demant (born 21 April 1995) is a New Zealand rugby union player.

Ruaheli Devon Demant was born on 21 April 1995.

As she was born on the day Team New Zealand won the 1995 Louis Vuitton Cup she acquired the nicknamed Lu.

Her father was commercial cray fisherman.

She has five siblings, among whom are sisters Erina and Kiritapu.

She spent her childhood in the small coastal settlement of Ōmāio, in an area known as Little Awanui, in the eastern Bay of Plenty.

Demant and her younger sister Kiritapu grew up playing soccer with boys because there were no girls teams locally.

They also played netball, basketball, hockey, touch rugby and rugby league.

Demant and her siblings grew up speaking Māori as their first language at home.

They first attended the Tokamaii Kohanga Reo, before attending Te Kura Mana Maori o Maraenui school, near Opotoki, where all the lessons are in Maori.

In 2007 just before her 12th birthday her parents sold their crayfish quota and moved the family north to Leigh near Warkworth where Demant initially attended Mahurangi Christian School in Snells Beach.

which assisted her in the transition from te reo into an English-speaking teaching system.

Here she was made the Year 8 head prefect.

At the 2010 Ngā Manu Kōrero National Secondary School Speech Contest 15 year old Demant finished second overall in the junior section and was awarded the Dame Whina Cooper Trophy for the best performance by a girl in the junior section.

After competing her high school education, Demant moved to Auckland to study law at Auckland University.

Encouraged by their mother Vikki, Demant and her sister Kiritapu played touch rugby for Mahurangi, Harbour, Sharks and in the Whangteau competition.

They were coached by former All Black Glen Osborne and his wife, Kylee.

Both were selected for the New Zealand under 15 girls team.

The sisters also played basketball, football, netball, rugby sevens and fifteen-a-side rugby at secondary school.

While playing for Mahurangi College senior girls touch team, Demant suffered what a ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) injury to her knee.

As a result she was forced to miss her final touch tournament with the team.

Deamant also began playing fifteen-a-side rugby at Mahurangi and loved it but while the school was able to field 15 players in her first year, it dropped to 10 in the second which was insufficient to field a team.

With limited opportunities for girls to play rugby in their region Demand and Kiritapu became aware that the College Rifles Rugby Club in Remuera, Auckland was a supportive environment for girls and women’s rugby.

Upon arriving for their first training run Demant later recalled “I remember Dad drove Kiritapu and me to our first practice and we saw these huge Tongan props approaching the car.

We begged Dad to take us home, but he refused.”

In 2012 during her final year at high school Demant was selected at the age of 17 for the Auckland Storm rugby team, which went on to win that year’s Farah Palmer Cup.

She continued her education at Mahurangi College in Warkworth, where in 2013 she was the school’s head girl.

Her rugby was curtailed early in the 2013 season, when 10 minutes into a game against Taranaki she ruptured the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in her left knee.

Following reconstruction she returned the team for the following season, during which the Auckland Storm again won the Farah Palmer Cup.

In 2015 while competing at a sevens tournament in Mt Manganui she ruptured her ACL in her right knee.

She returned in time to assist the Auckland Storm in once again winning the Farah Palmer Cup.

When she was 20 Demant while playing in the first sevens tournament of the summer once again damaged the ACl in her left knee, making it her third such injury.

She made her debut for the New Zealand national women's team, the Black Ferns, against Australia in 2018.

A utility back, Demant plays as a first five-eighth, second five-eighth or centre.

She was named 2022 World Rugby player of the year.

Demant was co-captain of the Black Ferns team that won the 2021 Rugby World Cup.

At the age of 23 Demant made her debut for Black Ferns at first-five eighth in Sydney against Australia on 18 August 2018 which the team won 33–11.

A week later she was in the team which won, 45–17 against Australia at Eden Park.

three further games followed in 2018, one against the USA in Chicago and two games against France, one at Toulon and the other at Grenoble, all being won by the Black Ferns.

Demant’s performance in the domestic season saw her once again selected for the Black Ferns, this time playing in games in San Diego in July 2019 against Canada, the USA, France and England (beaten 28–13).