Skill and Good Competition at Warrior 7s
Skill and Good Competition at Warrior 7s
Berks County won the Warrior 7s tournament Sunday in Reading, Pa., taking both 1st and second in a competitive boys HS event on the Pennsylvania summer calendar.
The tournament was sponsored in part by Next Phase Rugby, which is also a Goff Rugby Report sponsor and partner, and which is an app that help college rugby programs (varsity and club) connect with high school rugby players.
The app has more than 250 college rugby teams registered on it, and thousands of high school student-athletes. Download the app at NextPhaseRugby.com.
In the competition, Berks had entered two teams, and when there was a late cancelation they put in a third team that did quite well. Morris out of New Jersey, as well as Pennsylvania teams Coventry and the Hempfield Knightmares all entered one team, while the Minutemen out of the DC/Virginia area entered two.
Berks II was perhaps the surprise of the tournament, going 3-0 in pool play, including a defeat of Minutemen I. The Berks II effort was highlights by a brilliant kick-and-chase from Matt Cleland where he spotted some space, popped a perfectly-weighted kick, chased it down, nudged the ball ahead with his boot, and then touched down in-goal.
“I do a lot of kicking in 15s so it comes pretty easily to me,” Cleland said after the game. “And we’re always taught if it’s a bad bounce then keep kicking it.”
Cleland said he wasn’t worried about kicking the ball so hard it would roll dead.
“I felt pretty comfortable that I could do it and score.”
The Berks I side, meanwhile, torched their opposition with speed and elusiveness. They had Diohnny Ruiz on the field and he was approaching 40 tries for the spring, 15s and 7s. But Ruiz wasn’t the only danger man and he knew it, as often through the day he spent his time setting up Steven Flinton, who is pretty quick and elusive in his own right, and pocket rocket Anthony Bourassa.
In fact, Flinton ended up leading the tournament in tries. Both sides won their semifinal—Berks II by a conversion over Minutemen II, and faced off in the final. There was no desire to just not play the game as the physical, power game of Berks II wanted to match up against the speed game of Berks I.
Before the game, Ruiz said “speed kills” and in the end he was right. Battered a little from their tough semifinal, Berks II had difficulty containing the Berks I runners, and two mistakes early on—the kickoff not 10 meters and then a yellow card for n intentional knock-on—spelled trouble in the opening minute.
A tap by Ruiz where he finally called his own number and raced through opened the scoring. Ruiz then took a break and lofted a pass over a defender for Bourassa to grab and take to paydirt—10-0 Berks I.
Ruiz then raced down the sideline and was in at the corner to make it 15-0. Berks II tried to crash through but Berks I were pretty happy to meet them at the point of contact and defended well.
In the second half Bourassa made a nice half break and linked up with Cole Boyer to make it 22-0. Jax Shingleton powered up the middle to finally get Berks II a try. But right after that Aiden Pavlek answered right back with an impressive run.
Bourassa finished it off 34-5.
Flinton was electric throughout the game despite not scoring, and his huge try total for the tournament as a whole got him the MVP award.
Also at the Warrior 7s
Doylestown won the girls event. More on them in another article. They went 3-0-1 in a double round-robin with Downingtown and Conestoga that was very competitive. Unfortunately, a late bout with COVID meant Aspetuck, slated to compete, could not be there.
The Western Suburbs Barbarians out of Virginia won the Junior championship, showcasing some impressive skills and teamwork. They beat Coventry 31-14 in the final. Overall the Barbarians outscored their opponents 126-36.
Good showing from the Coventry youth team at Warrior 7s. pic.twitter.com/jH91S2hdxR
— Alex Goff (@goffrugbyreport) June 27, 2022
In the Youth Division, Berks upset Doylestown 21-12 to book a spot in the final, where they met a big, powerful Coventry team that steamrolled right over them. It was an impressively competitive Youth event, and Coventry won the final over Berks 19-12.