Both Boys HS leagues in North Carolina are tight at the top as three or four in each league are pushing for 1st place.

In the single-school league in North Carolina, which includes 12 teams, Myers Park beat the Ardrey Kell Knights 31-14 to move to 5-0. Three teams - South Meck Sabres, WA Hough Huskies, and Providence Panthers - are 4-1. 

South Meck slammed East Meck 109-0 this past weekend. 

(Before you roll your eyes at East Meck, take note that East Meck is in a rebuilding year with a new coach and fronted up all day, even when they could have cut the game short.)

South Meck is pretty good, though, and broke a ton of tackles, leading to three tries for Brandon Sanders, two for James McClendon, Connor Hayes, Raelin Carpenter, and Darius Gamble. Taran Heise scored a try and seven conversions for 19 points, and Carpenter kicked five conversions to make it a points total of 20.

For Myers Park, however, they are liking lift at the top of the standings.

“We've got a strong core of experienced senior players mixed with a group of new to rugby athletes,” said Coach Tyree Reed. “Our backline has been anchored by fast pace play from our centers. Our forward pack has been held together by our strong front row.

That front row of Abe loven, Luke Kabrich, and landon Jackson have done the tough work, and on defense especially lock Evan Maibodi has been excellent. 

But there’s more to do.

“We have four big matches coming up in the next three weeks,” said Reed. “We play the top two NC club teams Charlotte Catholic and Union County. Then in our league we play 2 out of the top three teams, South Meck and Providence. So to finish out the season strong we need to get back to basics, minimize simple mistakes and play physical.”

In the Open League, remember that single-school team Charlotte Catholic opted to move to the Open League. So far it’s working fine as Catholic, and Union County Lions are 4-0. Union County just came off an impressive win over the Charlotte Tigers.

The Lions did well to use their forwards and work on the basics of taking care of the ball and making their tackles.

Charlotte Catholic won a forfeit game, and should be favored in the next couple of weeks until they clash with Charlotte Tigers, Union County, and the Chapel Hill Highlanders in the final weeks of the league season. Watch out also for the Raleigh Rattlesnakes and Charlotte Tigers, who are both 3-1 and not out of it by any stretch.

And then there are the defending state champion Chapel Hill Highlanders. They won 53-12 over the Cape Fear Flytraps to move to 4-1. The Highlanders actually are in 1st due to playing an extra game over Catholic and the Lions, and so lead on standings points.

It was a solid all-around performance for the Highlands. Manny Seyon was against impressive and outside center Seamus Brennan was player of the game.