Californians Lead in Great Northwest Challenge

It's going to be a Californian champion at the Great Northwest Challenge in the Boys Varsity Bracket after all three California teams won out.

Nine teams started the day in Corvallis, Ore., and the format is one of Goff Rugby Report's favorite formats - three pools of three, with the pool winners going into a round-robin for 1st on Day Two, and the 2nd-place teams playing a round-robin for 4th, and the 3rd-place teams playing a round-robin for 7th.

The format guarantees every team four games, and doesn't rely on tiebreakers among teams that don't play each other.

Photos Dan Bandoni.

Sac Valley JVs were pretty dominant.

In Pool 1, Sacramento Valley defeated Oregon and Montana to go 2-0. But it almost was Oregon's day, as Sac Valley and the Red Hawks faced off in the first game of the day, and Oregon almost won. The Redhawks led 20-17 with almost no time left when Chase Jones, a lock who plays his spring rugby for the Solo Falcons, charged down a clearance kick, toed it ahead, and dove on the ball to score the game-winner in a 22-20 Sac Valley victory. 

It was just reward for Jones, who had an outstanding day. Not so many of the other Sac Valley players, as they struggled with early mistakes.

"We were lucky to win," said Sac Valley Coach Jason Division. "We had a lot of jitters and a lot of nervous energy and we made a bunch of stupid mistakes. It was a good punch in the face for us and it woke us up, but we almost lost the game."

Justin Oles, normally a center, started at flanker, but was move back to the midfield midway through the game, and his presence helped re-energize the Sac Valley attack.

Meanwhile, the Bay Area NorCal team looked in dominant form, slamming Rhino Training Academy 39-10 and then handing the Washington Wolverines a humbling 68-5 loss. The issue with the three-team round-robin schedule is that two teams in each trio have to effect a quick turnaround. This was the case for the Wolverines.

The 9-10-12 combination of Kevin Saunders (Danville), Chris Toetuu (Danville), and Cutler Pons (Peninsula Green) were very good for Bay Area, while Danville-based No. 8 Damon Wiley featured heavily on the scoresheet. Center/fullback Faitala Talapusi (Pen Green) was also excellent.

"We just came together very quickly and have been playing well as a unit," said Jon Straka, one of the Bay Area coaches.  

The Southern California Griffins were also impressive on the day, beating the Washington Loggers 22-13 in a tough early encounter, and then handling Western Idaho 34-3.

Here are the Boys Varsity Scores and Sunday's games:

In the JV bracket, it was the same story. The only difference was that the close game was SoCal v. Washington, which ended 10-5. Still, SoCal prevailed, and also prevailed against the Rhino White team 31-26. Bay Area and Sac Valley both won their two games fairly comfortably, and in fact neither gave up a point.