Royal Irish and Bishop Dwenger will face off Monday for the Rugby Indiana Super League title after both teams won semifinals on Saturday.

For Dwenger, this continues to be their best season in some time and it’s a case of a group of players that has bought in to the approach and are playing together.

Dwenger defeated Brownsburg 31-5, a team that had held them to just two tries a week ago. Either way, Dwenger’s defense has been very effective.

“Our defense woke up quickly,” said Dwenger Head Coach Sam DiFilippo. “We gave up the first try about three minutes into the first half. We left our wing open and they exposed it quickly. But the boys bounced back.”

giving up that try told the Dwenger players they were in a rugby game and they had better get it sorted out. They did.

“We spent the last week working on communicating between breakdowns and being focused during the recycle,” said DiFilippo. “Credit goes to how confident and comfortable our seniors are on the pitch. They trust each other and always look for work.”

Royal Irish went one better, beating HSE 37-0. Head Coach David Snyder said the score didn’t show how well HSE played, and how much Royal Irjsh had to work for every point.

“They are a good team and I do think we played well,” said Snyder. “All things considered, with this being our first game back after three weekends with no games, we did well We started slow, but knocked the dust off and our goal was to not let them score and we did that.”

Royal Irish has been focusing on defense in training, reasoning, correctly, that their offensive pattern is good enough to get them points when executed correctly, will get them tries.

They worked on being together in the defensive line and succeeded in that. 

“Everybody plays hard against us,” said Snyder. “Everybody wants to knock us off, and we feel we need to reestablish ourselves.”

Logan O’Brien, who moved from lock to prop this season, had a huge game. O'Brien also plays football and basketball and his handling skills along with his size and power were on display. He ran well and had one break where his series of sidesteps and changes of direction had the defenders all twisted around.

“It was beautiful to watch a large man run like that,” said Snyder.

Rugby Indiana is not holding a JV championship so Royal Irish and Dwenger decided to play a JV game Saturday as well. Because of injuries and other issues Royal Irish only had 29 players for the day, and suited up 14 for the JV match. They fulfilled the fixture as promised, a game won 37-13 by Dwenger, and that meant that their team to face HSE was 15 players and no subs. Every player played the full game.

“This COVID season continues to have its effect,” said Snyder. “Our guys rose to the occasion.”

Now the two will look to Monday for the final.

“That Fort Wayne team is not to be taken for granted,” said Snyder of Bishop Dwenger. “And we’re super excited. This is what it’s all about—Indiana teams playing well in this state. The rise of Dwenger is good for rugby and good for the sport in the state.”