Simsbury to Connecticut Final
Simsbury will play in the Connecticut state final for the first time in the team's history.
In this weekend's semi, Simsbury took on a Fairfield Prep team it had defeated 28-10 earlier in the season. That game was a good gauge of how strong Simsbury is, but this past weekend's semi was much closer. Playing in front of a large home crowd, Simsbury jumped out to a 19-10 lead. Fairfield Prep came back and the teams were tied 24-24 with ight minutes to play. Simsbury rode its forwards and Jackson King followed a Joe Matteo run down the weak side to score the go-ahead try. Fairfield still have plenty of time to come back, but Simsbury held on.
Simsbury captain Jasper Stone, Jake Ruzsbowski, Owen Jahne, and Raphael Nieves also scored tries.
Pennsylvania Crowns HS and Youth Champs
Rugby Pennsylvania crowned their state champions this weekend, with a surprise or two along the way.
Played in Mechanicsburg and Conshohocken, Pa, the championships covered two days, with semifinals and finals in Boys HS Club, Boys Varsity, Girls DI and DII, and Juniors and Youth.
In the girls brackets, Moon Area looked very impressive in the DII competition. Kiski Valley was pretty good, too, beating West Chester 61-0 in the semis. But Moon Area went one better, shutting out West Shore 50-0 in the semis, and turning around to keep Kiski Valley scoreless 43-0 in the final.
Boys Nationals Final Day Wrapup
The final day of action is done at the Boys HS Rugby National Championships.
Here's a rundown with links for more:
Jesuit honored their injured alumnus Robert Paylor and battled through illness to defeated Gonzaga 23-13 to win the single-school bracket. Full game report here.
Boys HS Nationals Live Stream
The Boys HS Rugby National Championships will be live-streamed by Goff Rugby Report partner FloRugby.Com.
Viewers need to sign up for FloRugby's service, and can do so by going to this link.
The tournament runs Thursday, May 18, Friday May 19, and Saturday, May 20.
Each team plays one 60-minute game per day. The 60-game time leaves ten minutes for overtime, if needed.
Here's the schedule:
Swope Soccer Village, Kansas City, Mo. (all times central)
Thursday, May 18
1:30pm Field 1 St. Thomas Aquinas v South Bay (Tier II)
1:30pm Field 3 Brownsburg v Winnetonka (Tier II)
1:30pm Field 4 Jesuit II v Greenville (Tier II)
Observations and Notes from HS Nationals Day One
So the first day of the Boys HS Rugby Nationals is done and we've got a few observations:
Good Teams are Good
Well, duh. What we mean by that is, good teams are good at a lot of things, and if you take one thing away, they will find another way to beat you. In addition, good teams find something they're good at, and they do it again and again and again.
There is a HS Club Gap
The four HS Club games had an average score of 44-11. The club teams that really are strong have depth, excellent players everywhere, and put games away. By contract, three of the single-school gams gave us an average score of 27-12. Only Jesuit skews that with their blowout of Fishers. The assertion holds, however. There's a bigger gap between the very best HS Clubs and the next level, than there is in Single-School.
West Valley Makes Adjustment to Win Utah
The West Valley Warriors are Utah HS Club champions, but it wasn’t easy.
Despite rolling pretty heavily through the Utah season, the Warriors faced a somewhat new-look Genesis team on Saturday for the final. West Valley had defeated Genesis 36-10 earlier in the season, but this time Genesis had a new plan.
“Their lineup was different,” said West Valley Head Coach Epoki Mahina. “Their big boys didn’t play. They used their fitness to wear out my boys.”
West Valley has the ability to score quickly and did so early in the game. But after that Genesis did well to control possession and keep the ball away from the Warriors. It worked.
“By the end of the first half they’d come back and our guys were out of breath,” said Mahina. “We were scrambling and missing tackled. They had a game plan that we didn’t expect, and they played well.”
Herriman Get Payback in Utah Final
Herriman HS opened up their season with a 29-27 loss to Highland that shook up the rankings and how most people looked at Utah's single-school league; Saturday they got some payback.
It didn't look like it would be that way early on, as Highland took a lead into the halftime break. But in the second half, with Zak Barker and Noah Vaea playing their usual high standard, Herriman came back, and pulled away late to win 53-28.
"In the first game when we played Highland, they dominated us physically, especially in th scrums and around the rucks," said Herriman Coach Derek Smith. "We said to ourselves, we cannot allow them to beat us around the fringes. They still did a lot of really good stuff against us."
But, a somewhat smaller Herriman team battled hard and worked until the end, in fact finishing the game with a maul for a try.
Boys HS Nationals!
The Boys HS National Championships brackets and schedule are set for Swope Soccer Village in Kansas City, Mo. May 18-20.
The teams involved include the #1, #2, #3, and #4 - ranked single-school teams; #7, #9, #11, #14, #19, and #20 are also there. Among the HS clubs, #1, #2, #4, #8, #11, and #16 are there.
Tier II Preview (Note - St. Louis University High pulled out late. Winnetonka out of Missouri has stepped in as a replacemnt)
Harpeth Takes Tennessee in Impressive Fashion
The stage was set for another tough match between the Harpeth Harlequins and the Ravenwood Raptors of Middle Tennessee Saturday as these two teams played the Tennessee state final Saturday.
Union Wins Oklahoma
Union HS capped off an undefeated Oklahoma HS season with a 35-25 defeat of Bixby in the final of the Rugby Oklahoma playoffs.
The two teams matched each other in tries - both squads scoring five - but Union fullback David Sandoval kicked all five conversions, and that perfect afternoon proved the difference as Bixby was unable to convert any.
Bixby led 15-14 at halftime thanks to three tries to Union's two. Bixby's effort was led by flanker Colyn Farley, center Jagger Yelton, and fullback Charlie Young. In the second half, Union started to pick it up, with their HS All Americans stepping into the fray. Asa Carter caused all sorts of disruption in the rucks, while Tyreen Al Jiboori broke the gaineline repeatedly and scored a couple of tries. In fact, Union notched three, all converted, in the second half to win it.
Jesuit, Granite Bay Join Practice
The Jesuit HS and Granite Bay HS rugby teams practiced together over the weekend in order to prepare for the Boys HS Rugby National Championships.
Jesuit will be in the single-school bracket, and Granite Bay will be defending their HS Club title. The two teams, who are both based in the Sacramento area, trained together to get ready.
The BHSRNC will be live streamed by FloRugby. Click here for details.
Iowa HS 7s Champs Decided Today
The Iowa Rugby Association crowns a champion this weekend with their final 7s tournament of the season.
Iowa plays only 7s in the spring, with a series of tournaments leading to seeding for the final tournament, which will be May 12.
Friday night it will be an eight-team knockout tournament.
#1 seed Ankeny Centennial (11-1) plays Iowa City Trojans in the opening round.
Southeast Polk, the #2 seed, plays Dowling.
Ds Moines Lincoln (#4) plays Cedar Rapids Washington, and Ankeny (#3) faces Des Moines Roosevelt
2017 Iowa 7s season scores:
24 Urbandale 14 Indianola
Boys HS Games May 10-14
A week ahead of the Boys HS Rugby National Championships, the Boys HS season cranks up just a little bit more.
The playoffs for Southern California, Utah, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and MAVRC in the DC area culminate. Oregon gets its playoff started. For a recent rundown of state championships, go here.
The Utah playoffs are especially compelling, with the #8, #9, #10, and #31 single-school teams in the semis, and the #6 and #13 HS clubs in the multi-school club final.
Rugby Oklahoma Goes to Championship Weekend
For the fourth straight year Bixby and Union will play for the Rugby Oklahoma state title.
Union, which has actually been in the final five years in a row now, had about as tight a road to the final as you could have, getting by Jenks 22-21 in the semis. Union is still undefeated, but has been pushed repeatedly. With HS All American players Tyreen Al Jiboori and Asa Carter playing well, they are still going to give Bixby trouble.
With a very young team, Bixby did not have as successful a regular season as they would have liked, finishing out of the money in the Hooligan Cup and the St Louis Ruggerfest. But a large amount of games has given the players a chance to get up to speed, and the teams had done well the last few weeks.
Single-School Rankings Analysis
The Goff Rugby Report / FloRugby Boys Single-School Rankings might be a little bit of a look into the Boys HS Rugby National Championships seedings.
Everyone knew that St. Ignatius was vulnerable at #1. It's not that they weren't deserving, but Jesuit has hardly put a foot wrong, and as a result, if anyone slipped at all, Jesuit was poised to pounce. As it was, Jesuit won over a top-ranked club team, Danville, and St. Ignatius lost to a highly-ranked school team, Penn.
