St. Mary's, CWU Lead Way in DI 7s

It took 13 hours and wasn’t settled until the last game, but the Men’s DI College Championships got its first day of action in the books.

St. Mary’s and Central Washington looked unstoppable. Both teams had their little moments, but in the end always righted the ship and severely punished opposition mistakes.

St. Mary’s showcased an impressive defensive front, bottling up the likes of Colorado State and Texas State so they couldn’t get out of their 22. And when they got turned over, the Gaels were impressive, moving the ball quickly to the open man. Kingsley McGowan, Dylan Audsley, and Holden Yungert were impressive in the early going on attack, and Vili Helu laid in some big hits.

It all worked well, and set them up for a final pool match against 2-0 West Virginia. In a game delayed in the middle for an hour due to lightning, St. Mary’s had no trouble with rain or darkness or a mid-game delay - they handles personnel changes and just kept scoring tries, winning 40-0.

Central Washington was as impressive. With Vili Toluta’u rattling bones with his tackles, and Zach Siemens and Scott Dean playing some superb support rugby, the Wildcats defeated North Texas 31-7, Nevada 52-0, and San Diego State 27-0 to win their pool.

“We got better through the day,” said CWU Head Coach Tony Pacheco. “In the first game, for us not having any games to play, we were OK. We had some awareness issues, but we got better and performed very well against a very good San Diego State team. To go three for three was very good.”

Central Washington may well be meeting San Diego State in the quarterfinals, as well, as SD State held on to take one of two wild card spots.

“Everyone in the quarterfinals wants to win the tournament,” said Pacheco. “We’re no different.”

Lindenwood survived some very physical clashes, especially with Central Florida in a fractious game that went to Lindenwood 17-7. The big news for Lindenwood is that Morgan Findlay taped up his leg and was possibly cleared to play. He didn’t, but one wonders if that will be true on Sunday.

The final game of the day saw two 2-0 teams match up with Davenport and Utah. Davenport scored two quick tries to lead 12-0. But Utah clawed their way back and with three minutes to go led 20-19 - four tries but no conversions. Then Casey Moag went over to clinch it for Davenport. 

“We have a lot of experienced guys who have payed 7s together,” said Davenport JP Eloff about the transition from 15s to 7s. “We’re all working toward to the same goal. We know we have the athletes, the knowledge. If we stick to our pattern is what we need to do now.”

Eloff said the Panthers retained the focus even after easy wins. 

“It’s definitely possible [to be complacent],” he said. “But when we put in our subs they just played amazing and we stayed with our pattern.”

And AIC went 3-0 in their pool, having to battle in their final game against Wisconsin. Despite the fact that Wisconsin was likely out of the running for a quarterfinal spot, they gave AIC fits. Turnovers at key times - including a pick-7 at the end of the first half of that game, made life difficult for AIC.

Yellow Jackets Coach Josh Macy said he was unimpressed with his team’s performance, but there were flashes of brilliance, including a big try from Seth Halliman, some scintillating running from Jihad Khabir, and a brilliant kick to the corner from Kurtis Werner that Christian Adams chased down.

Arizona State won their pool game, but were anything but polished at the end of the day. They lost 19-17 to Cal Poly, which shook off an early loss to Iowa to finish 2-1. Iowa was also 2-1, but ASU survived thanks to points difference, with Keenan Mayfield, Alex Sandstrom, and Adam Sandstrom playing well - although the Sandstroms didn’t get nearly enough ball.

So here are the standings.

That sets up Sunday's Quarterfinals: