Boys All-Star teams from North Carolina and South Carolina squared off in a tuneup in advance of the Life RAST tournament next weekend. 

 

Both the Varsity and JV teams from each state clashed, with North Carolina winning both, as coaches evaluated their players.

 

Both teams traveled to Clemson University and ran three 20-minute periods. North Carolina triumphed 36 to 3 in the varsity match and 17 to 10 in the JV match.  Both teams have plenty to think about this week and look forward to when the matches count.

 

North Carolina started the varsity match in commanding fashion with a long run by Michael Maughan, converted by Duncan Van Schalkwyk. Van Schalkwyk added a penalty kick a few minutes later to increase the lead to 10-0.  South Carolina battled back, as they did all day, and took advantage of a not rolling away penalty to make the score 10-3. But the tried were coming from North Carolina.

 

Center Flapp Bradshaw added a long run, converted by Duncan to increase the lead to 14 points t 17-3. Then Korbin Miller retrieved a clearance kick and offloaded it to Jesse, who broke a tackle and ran 50 meters to bring the score to 22-3 after the first period.

 

The teams made a number of subs, but North Carolina continued to gel as a team a little bit faster than South Carolina.  Tyler Harrington had a long run and a nice offload to Miller, who dotted down the first try of the second period, converted by Duncan. Bradshaw added another off a South Carolina turnover deep in their own territory to make it 36-3 after Duncan’s conversion.  

 

South Carolina was unable to take advantage of a North Carolina penalty deep in their territory and had the ball held up in-goal right before the end of the period.

 

The third period saw no scoring as both teams battled back and forth.  South Carolina started to find continuity and put pressure on North Carolina, but was unable to put down a try despite getting into in-goal three times. Certainly North Carolina showed that having a few more practices together matters.

 

The JV sides took longer to start working as a team, and the game was back and forth as the inevitable mistakes marked the early going. Reid Brandt from North Carolina dotted down an early try.  South Carolina took a 10-7 lead off an errant pass by North Carolina and then a penalty kick. George Sharpe added a try for North Carolina to make it 12-10 lead and then Brandt added a final try to secure the victory.  South Carolina forwards did very well in the scrums and lineouts, but the North Carolina loose forwards were the ones who put in the tries.