Over the past three weeks teams from U14 through U19 battled for the right to be crowned Rugby Georgia State Champions in their respective age groups. 

Rugby Georgia has seen an increase in player enrollment since emphasis was placed on rookie rugby and growing middle school programs.  After a few years of seeing teams merge or fold at the high school level, the strategy of growing from the ground up is paying dividends. However, with the U19 teams, not all have been able to show the depth to play a championship 15s season, and so the finals was actually a 7s tournament. 

U14s

This year three of the four MS programs battled for bragging rights at the U14 level with Phoenix Rugby coming out on top and hoisting the cup.  The match was played at Silverbacks Stadium, home of the Atlanta Barbarians (Union) and Atlanta Rhinos (League) between Phoenix and Atlanta Youth Rugby (AYR).  Phoenix took an early lead in the match only to see the upstart AYR club storm back in the 2nd half.  In the end the Phoenix was able to hold off AYR and come away with a 33-22 victory.  The Man of the Match was Isaiah John from Phoenix Rugby and Aleksander Fogle from AYR.

U16s, U17s

Life University was the site of the HS boys U17 and U16 championships.  To open the evening, upstart Etowah faced off against the Roswell Rebels.  The interesting aspect of this match is that over the previous two seasons Etowah was part of the Roswell club and due to growth of the program and player recruitment the lads from Cherokee County were able to branch off and start their own club.  The match was a heavy-weight battle of two strong and very physical clubs.

Etowah opened the scoring as Ramone Devezin crossed the try line for a 5-0 lead.  However, the lead did not last long as Roswell responded as one of the Rebels huge forwards, Keshawn Lawrence powered into the try zone for the score.  The conversion was successful for a 7-5 lead.  The Rebels never relinquished the lead and went on to capture the U17 championship 26-10.  The Man of the Match from Roswell was Keshawn Lawrence and Raymone Devezin from Etowah.

In the nightcap, AYR and Phoenix battled for the U16 crown.  The score was deadlocked 0-0 at the 15-minute mark of the 1st half when the Phoenix went on a scoring rampage.  The final score was 60-5 and Black Bibb of the Phoenix was named Man of the Match.  While the score seemed lopsided, the match was closer than what was reflected from the score.  After the match both teams came together at mid-field and Rugby Georgia VP of Competition Mark Tibbetts acknowledged the accomplishments of both clubs.  After three years in existence AYR participated in the championships of two age brackets and continue to grow their club from the bottom up.  Tibbetts then went on to say, “after 5 years of watching the Phoenix program, this U16 squad was the best he has ever seen”.  There were no arguments from the fore-fathers of the Phoenix club.

U19s 7s

Rugby Georgia’s season concluded with the U19’s HS boys 7’s tournament.  Due to the number of clubs that could not support a full U19’s squad, the Union decided to have this age bracket participate in a number of 7’s round robin weekends throughout the season.  Teams from AYR, Brunswick (south-Georgia), East Cobb and Phoenix participated in this format as the two later teams also fielded 15’s clubs in the MSIRL.  At the end of the final match, Phoenix Rugby came out of the Championship Tournament undefeated and captured the 2018 Rugby Georgia U19 Sevens Championship.