St. Edward Defeats Moeller, Books Nationals Spot
St. Edward Defeats Moeller, Books Nationals Spot
St. Edward defeated Archbishop Moeller 29-8 on a cold Saturday in Cleveland, Ohio to secure a play-in for the Boys HS Rugby National Championships.
Ed's defended well in a fixture that is always intense and carries plenty of physicality. But with scrumhalf Owen Ahern and flyhalf Tommy Graham working well together they were able to run in five tries.
It was cold at kickoff and it got colder, with a few snowflakes floating around. Ed's began on the front foot with Graham's shiftiness complemented nicely by the mobile play of the front row consisting of Andrew Henderson, Luke Dotson, and Ray Jenne.
It was their ability to get into position and also embrace contact that got the Eagles going and finally No.8 Tommy Van Oosten worked it over. Graham converted and it was 7-0 St. Edward.
Moeller came back with a nice combination of a powerful tight five and backs that looked to run. Ed's handled them defensively for the most part but a little inexperience saw them make some mistakes dealing with the Moeller kicking game.
The result was Moeller being able to put St. Edward under pressure and eventually opting for three points on a penalty.
As the first half progressed, St. Edward got into their pattern a bit more and some good runs from Dotson, who was probably the best Eagle on the day, set them up and Henderson finished it off. Graham converted to make it 14-3 after 22 minutes.
After running into some penalty trouble in the breakdown, St. Edward seemed to figure things out and were able to steal some ball in the breakdown. Moeller tried to reciprocate onto to get penalties for no tackler release.
That allowed Ed's to work their way into the Moeller half again and off a tap penalty move Dotsoon lowered the shoulder and steamrolled over a tackler to score the third St. Edward try. That made it 19-3 at the break.
The second half saw St. Edward struggle to find that continuity that worked so well for them in the first half. However, with Moeller struggling at set piece—including losing two scrums against the head—they weren't in too much danger. Off one of those scrum steals St. Edward worked it left on the weakside, and flanker Luke Wilkins was over to make it 24-3.
With the St. Edward defense punishing any slow passes from Moeller, it was tough for Big Moe. But in the end they did spin it wide and score in the corner.
St. Edward answered. With a red card putting Moeller down a man Wilkins was able to find some space to ice it.
Eagles Head Coach Greg Miranda said it wasn't his team's best game, and the parts of the second half weren't perfect, but he acknowledged that the players did show some of the lessons they had learned playing some top competition earlier in the season. And to win a play-in and secure a spot at the National tournament was certainly a big deal.
Playing those tough early games "builds grit, builds character," said Dotson. "It builds our bodies."
"In every game there's going to be ups and downs," added Graham. "Against better teams they're going to make you pay for your mistakes way more so it just puts a way bigger emphasis on us to eliminate all our mistakes, keep the ball in hand, and play our rugby."
Next up for St. Edward is a trip to Illinois to face an in-form St. Martin's Kingfishers out of Kansas, and then hosts Notre Dame de la Salette, who secured their spot at the national tournament this weekend also with a win over Penn HS.
