St. Louis University High held an all-Catholic-School tournament this past weekend and the Kansas City area did fairly well, with St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Martin's Kingfishers both winning all of their games.

Since Aquinas and Kingfishers are slated to play each other soon, they didn't play each other in the tournament, so both came out undefeated.

Aquinas beat SLUH 34-13 and Father Ryan 35-5 on Saturday and 64-12 over Notre Dame de la Salette on Sunday. Kingfishers beat Chaminade 58-3 and Notre Dame de la Salette 55-5 on Saturday, and 48-0 over Father Ryan on Sunday.

"SLUH put on a great tournament," said Aquinas Head Coach Tim Kluempers. "The idea of an all-Catholic-School tournament is a really good one and it can grow. They hosted us well and had a Saturday night Mass for the teams as well, which was great."

On the field Aquinas saw some nice work from their second row pairing of Ryan Yankovich and Chris Glenn rising to a high level over the weekend. Glenn accompanied the Aquinas team on their tour of Ireland and that helped him raise his game.

Noah Willy, a defensive end in football, has taken to the game and emerged as an effective ball-poacher. He poached maybe 15 balls over the weekend.

In the backs Joey Pollock, fullback, was player of the game against La Salette, and flyhalf Gabe Meier continued to improve. Earlier this season Kluempers moved Chandler Mogron from flyhalf to wing and the move has worked out. Mogren's speed is used well on the wing and Mogren's understanding of the game and backline structure allows him to help his teammates as they organize.

Mogren is part of a talented set of outside backs at Aquinas.

"The thing is they are able to find work to do and become a nuisance to so many defenses," said Kluempers.

"It was a great experience for our boys, both for the tournament setting, but also for their rugby play," said St. Martin's Head Coach Adam Taylor. "We'd been in a bit of a funk the last few weeks, but rediscovered our mojo after getting some good work in practice on the fundamentals."

Kingfishers ran with confidence and smart support work allowed post-contact offloads. The backs varied their attack and the forwards got involved in the attack. Center Nate Jones even slotted a drop goal in open play.

"On defense, we smothered all three teams' attacks with the best tackling we've had all year, contesting every breakdown, and shutting down wide play by the opposition backs with great shift defense," said Taylor.

Scrumhalf Joe Moleski, No. 8 Keoni Thorp, and wing Joe Klassen stood out for St. Martin's, while hooker Juan Pablo Gallo was player of the game in the Kingfishers' JV game with SLUH.