Aircraft Charter Solutions PoW - Andrew Buntrock
Aircraft Charter Solutions PoW - Andrew Buntrock
Unsung.
That’s the word. It means you don’t get a lot praise. It’s related to idea centuries ago that the deeds of heroes would be remembered in song and poem.
Rarely do we sing about enough about the work of tight five forwards on a successful team. And yet rarely does a team win without those players doing something meaningful. For the University of Minnesota-Duluth, certain backs such as Trace Bolstad and Logan Hanson helped the Fighting Penguins on their road to a national title. Certainly No. 8 Jake Luetgers, with his punishing runs and game-shifting try in the second half of the final had something to do with it, also.
But the tight five was central, and central to that group, as much as anyone, was lock Andrew "Teddy" Buntrock. The big second row was all about playing defense and winning ball, and not worrying too much about who scored the tries - just that they got scored.
"Andy has been a great leader for our team," said UMD Head Coach Jeramy Katchuba. "He has a tremendous work rate for a second row and takes care of a lot of the little things that don’t always get noticed. He has been a big part of the engine that has been making the pack so strong the past three years."
Buntrock, of course, deflects such praise in favor of thinking about his teammates.
"Andy has been a great leader for our team," said UMD Head Coach Jeramy Katchuba. "He has a tremendous work rate for a second row and takes care of a lot of the little things that don’t always get noticed. He has been a big part of the engine that has been making the pack so strong the past three years."
Buntrock, of course, deflects such praise in favor of thinking about his teammates.
“We’re like brothers in the pack,” Buntrock told Goff Rugby Report. “We just do the work, and we do it together. It’s fun. We want to play at as high a level as possible, and we’ve done that all year. My job is to maintain the rucks, keep the ball, and make sure we control the scrum. I want to make sure out eight man gets the best ball I can give him every time. That’s what I take pride in.”
Buntrock was a football and hockey player in high school in Minnesota. When he arrived at Duluth he was thinking about walking on with the football team, but a friend suggested he try rugby, and the rest is history. The senior journalism major never looked back.
“I kind of fell in love with the sport at the first practice,” said the 6-4 second row. “I just love playing it. I love being on this team. Winning this year was huge for us. It’s a whole new feeling. We won last year but to come back and show we could do it two years in a row kind of proved some things.”
It wasn’t easy. While Duluth rambled through and over all of their opponents getting to the final, they found themselves up against a formidable opponent in Wisconsin-Whitewater in the championship game. UWW led 14-5 at halftime before Luetgers powered over from long range. But the key turning point may well have been their defensive stand at 14-10. Whitewater came away from a long period inside the Duluth 22 with no points, and soon thereafter UMD scored through Hanson to take the lead.
“Whitewater gave us as tough of a game as we’ve had all season,” said Buntrock. “We had to handle that and make adjustments. But we did. We knew at halftime that we could play better. Our defense had been lacking and we needed to get back to what we do well. That defensive stand was huge, and it felt great to hold them out. And we did it by working together.”
So they did, and so it might be unfair to single out one player from UMD for our Aircraft Charter Solutions Player of the Week, but we did so anyway. A symbol of the unsung, Minnesota-Duluth second row forward Andrew Buntrock.
