Kutztown University, James Madison, and Navy all went 3-0 on the first day of the URugby ACRC 7s in Virginia Beach, Va., Saturday, in what was an exciting day of college 7s rugby.

KU won big over Lehigh, defeated St. Joseph’s 26-5, and held off Delaware 36-12 in a very impressive display led by the elusive running of Robert Stortz and Kina Malafu, the hard work of Wes Hartmann, and some overall skills from Murphy Lill, Alex Faison-Donahoe, and Trent Hensley.

Lill was very much in the action

“We’re overall happy but we still have more work to do,’ said Lill, who added that winning big didn’t affect their attitude. “We play with a next-man-up mentality, and so we know the level of field won’t go down no matter who comes on the field.”

It was a very complete performance from a big, physical Kutztown team that also likes to move the ball. KU got the #1 seed thanks to a superior points difference compared to the other pool winners, but that may be a bit of an illusion, as Lehigh struggled to keep scores down.

The #2 seed was James Madison, which was led by a tenacious performance from Mo Katz and also got some nice plays from flyhalf Federico Meersohn. Hard-runners Erik Carlson and Will Rikard combined nicely. JMU was up-and-down, however. They led 19-0 over Drexel only to see Drexel outscore them 15-10 in the second half. They led Heat Elite 33-0 a minute into the second half, but couldn’t score any more.

That set up a late game against 2-0 Stony Brook. In that game, JMU pieced it all together. They held try-scorer danger-man Bryan Michel in relative check, and won 29-12.

So the question of who would be the #2 seed came down to the final game of the day, with 2-0 Penn State against 2-0 Navy. A win from Penn State would have seen PSU likely get the #2 spot. Navy took an early lead with a try from Gardy Lebon, who had an excellent game at scrumhalf. Kevin Trotter’s try tied the game at 7-7 at halftime. Navy took the lead when Jacob Griffin made a break and was taken down by a collar tackle before he could score. That led to a yellow card and a penalty try, and, unfortunately Griffin was injured on the play and could not continue.

Penn State managed to score through Joe Kelly, who converted his effort to make it 14-14. With almost no time left, Navy had one more shot, and Connor McNerny strode through a gap and galloped in to score what was the game-winner.

“We were tied at halftime in every game,” said Navy Head Coach Mike Flanagan. “And then we just turned it on in the second half. We’re playing a really good brand of 7s - it’s not what we were playing a few years ago, but it’s not a traditional style, either. We are still testing some guys and getting our shape together, preparing for the CRC. But we are using some width now.”

Penn State, St. Joseph’s, and Stony Brook all ended up 2-1 in pool play to get to the Cup Quarterfinals. Delaware and Drexel made the top eight as the best 3rd-place teams. Delaware did so despite a less-than-impressive game against St. Joe’s, but blowing out Lehigh and then hanging on with Kutztown and not letting that game get too far out of reach.

Drexel beat the Heat Elite 27-0 in their last game, with two tries from Trevor Bloomfield, to get the other wild card spot.

 

So the scores are as follows:

St. Joe’s 24-10 Delaware

Kutztown 55-0 Lehigh

JMU 29-15 Drexel

Stony Brook 17-0 Heat Elite

Penn State 31-0 Kutztown II

Navy 26-14 Old Dominion

Delaware 46-0 Lehigh

Kutztown 26-5 St. Joe’s

JMU 33-0 Heat Elite

Stony Brook 28-7 Drexel

Penn State 34-7 Old Dominion

Navy 19-7 Kutztown II

St. Joe’s 62-5 Lehigh

Kutztown 36-12 Delaware

Drexel 27-0 Heat Elite

JMU 29-12 Stony Brook

Kutztown 31-10 Old Dominion

Navy 21-14 Penn State

 

Cup Quarterfinals

#1 Kutztown v #8 Drexel

#4 Penn State v #5 St. Joseph’s

#3 Navy v #6 Stony Brook

#2 JMU v #7 Delaware

 

Bowl Semis

#9 Kutztown II v #12 Lehigh

#10 Old Dominion v #11 Heat Elite