New high school program Mountain Ridge is enjoying a strong start to a very promising rugby lifespan in Utah.

The single-school team in the southern part of Salt Lake County came out of the Herriman HS program and has former Herriman coaches and players on its staff. With some players of varied experience, and the influx of some talented players who have moved from Oregon, Mountain Ridge now sits atop the Utah Youth Rugby standings after a 3-1 performance on Saturday.

It’s worth noting that United, which was an impressive 4-0 last week, did not play this week as they are under quarantine. The United girls team did play and finished 2nd to Provo.

Mountain Ridge started the day a little slowly, losing 21-12 to Wasatch, but built through the day, beating Kearns 26-19, Brighton/Copper Hills 17-14, and Herriman 19-7.

“We wish we could have played United today,” said Head Coach Spencer Criddle. “We feel pretty good about where we are.”

Mountain Ridge was all set to start its program this past spring and had about 50 athletes ready to play. But the COVID-19 shutdown put paid to that, so they started this fall instead.

“We do have some players with experience and we have had a lot of guys who wanted to come out,” said Criddle. “Most of the players who signed up for the spring will be back but a lot are involved in football right now. So with the players we have we’re learning how to work together and play together. You never know who you’re going to have available because of injury or COVID or other reasons, so we all have to learn how to maintain continuity with different teammates.”

That has turned out OK, with Mountain Ridge having enough continuity to eke out some close games on Saturday.

Mountain Ridge has benefited from the arrival of the Roebeck brothers from Oregon. Senior Lebron is a superb flyhalf (and sometimes scrumhalf) who understands the flow of the game and is very dangerous on attack. Alejandro Bustillos has emerged as a hard worker, and scored his first two tries ever for the program on Saturday.

All of the Mountain Ridge players, however, have contributed.

“We do have some work to do on our fitness,” said Criddle. “We have a lot of 15s forwards playing and we need to be as fit as we can, with 7s being somewhat different from 15s in that regard. But we’re building, and it’s pretty exciting.”

Week 2 Wrap

With United out, there was a chase to see who could make it to the top. Herriman did well to go 3-1, losing only to Mountain Ridge, but it was that loss that saw Mountain Ridge take 1st.

Wasatch, after upsetting Mountain Ridge in the first game, could not quite capitalize on that confidence boost, and lost a close one to Herriman. Oddly, after having beaten a team that would win the rest of its games, Wasatch ended the day losing to a team that hadn't won all day. Close games were the norm on the day, with three of the 10 games being within a try, and three more being within two tries.

Brighton/Copper Hills showed significant improvement after going 0-4 a week before, this time beating Wasatch and Kearns and almost taking down Herriman.\