Tempe defeated in-state rivals Red Mountain in emphatic fashion Thursday night.

The Top-10-ranked Tempe beat Red Mountain 54-7. 

Tempe gained possession off the opening kickoff and methodically drove down the field with pounding runs from both backs and forwards; and flanker Villie Pulu punched the ball over in the first two minutes and Tempe led 7-0. Red Mountain responded and had the run of play for the next 15 minutes.

Tempe held tough on defense and had some turnovers as well as making some handling mistakes, ceding possession back to Red Mountain. Finally Red Mountain were driving into Tempe's half, lost the ball and wing Orion Kupu raced down the sideline from 50 meters out to score and make it 14-0.

A few minutes later flyhalf Alejandro Echeverria stepped inside of a would-be tackler and zipped in from 10 meters. Up 21-0 Tempe received the restart and pounded down to the Red Mountain 22. Lock Dietrich Abinet was able to break through some tacklers and score—26-0. 

Red Mountain once again came close to scoring, but Tempe's goalline defense held strong and finally forced a knock-on to end the first half.

The second half started off with a Tempe knock-on and a scrum for Red Mountain inside Tempe's half. More pressure from Red Mountain but again a loose ball ended up in Tempe's hands—fullback Tau Pauga picked it up cut outside to race in to make it 33-0.

The backs broke through again for Tempe and prop Luke Schaefer picked from a ruck and powered his way over to make it 40-0.

Red Mountain mounted another attack and this time finished it off, stepping through a gap and scoring to make it 40-7. Tempe then started to run into discipline problems, with dangerous tackles resulting in two concurrent yellow cards. But defensively they held on and then wing Tyreeq Obichere countered on a kick and outpaced defenders to score. Then Orion Kupu broke through for a long run, and that was it, 54-7.

Red Mountain will be ruing those turnovers in the Tempe half; they made good ground with their hard-running forwards and they played to the end. But Tempe's punishment of turnovers was impressive. We will see this matchup again in the Rugby Arizona State Championship on April 23.

For Tempe, lock Dietrich Abinet, No. 8 Ata Teutupe, and Schaefer at prop led the forwards, while Pulu, Pauga, and Kupu excelled out wide.