Being gluttons for punishment we at Goff Rugby Report World Headquarters have ranked the top 20 Boys HS Varsity all-star teams.

This is enormously difficult to do since most of these teams play just the one major tournament. So we judge them based on how they do in those tournaments, and then try to get a gauge, based on observations from witnesses as much as anything else, on the relative strength of the tournament and the opposition. Then we add in some stats, mostly judging the strength of the wins.

It's a flawed system, we readily agree. Could a tournament we think wasn't quite a strong actually have been stacked with the best players and best-coached squads? Yes, certainly.

So, regardless, here are the rankings. EIRA SoCal gets #1 not because Eagle Impact Rugby Academy is a sponsor of GRR (which it is), but because, playing in a supremely competitive tournament, EIRA SoCal dominated, winning the four games by an average of 42 points, including a shutout in the final against a really strong Utah team.

Bay Area comes in second. Yes, we know Pennsylvania had a slightly better points difference, but we look at the lineup of the Great Northwest Challenge against the lineup of the Northeast RCT and we have to say the GNC had stronger teams overall. And while maybe Bay Area's pool play opponents were just OK, they had to beat Sac Valley and Southern California on the second day.

Celtic Elite has an argument to be #2, but what drops them down is that the Ohio-based team didn't win by as big margins as Bay Area (against top teams that is - Bay Area beat SoCal and Sac Valley 29-10 and 29-7, while Celtic Elite beat N. Indiana 27-19 and Florida 25-12). It's close, for sure.

Then we look at the teams that lost a game. Utah beat Texas, so Utah is above Texas. Florida beat both South Carolina and North Carolina, and so tops those two. South Carolina's score against Arkansas wasn't as good as North Carolina's, but the score against Florida was better. It's a tough call, but we pick South Carolina over North Carolina.

That leaves Sac Valley, which beat SoCal, Oregon, and Montana, but lost to Bay Area, and Indy Speed, which beat Heart of America, 5785, and Missouri but lost to Texas. In the end, Indy Speed's wins were very close, and that drops them down. Sac Valley's performance was very good, but after some study we decided that Utah was more dominant in their wins, and just ahead of Texas. Again, this could be very different. Florida could be #5.

Despite being 3-1, the Washington Loggers are below North Indiana and SoCal in the rankings. This is because, first of all, the Loggers lost to SoCal, and second of all, the remainder of their wins were against good opposition, but we feel North Indiana was tested a little more. It's a gut feeling that North Indiana Hawks would beat the Loggers. 

Illinois Tornados North were 2-0 in their RCT, but are ranked lower because they lost some other warmup games, and we're not sold on the strength of the Midwest Challenge Cup. 

And at 19 and 20 we have two teams that lost only once. Met NY and WNY/Cap tied each other, twice. Both times Met NY won on kicks, but really they were ties. Greenwich, unfortunately, didn't play either of these teams - things would have been easier for us if they had!. They did play Rugby Pa, and lost by less than WNY or Met NY did, so you could argue they were better. But their wins over Massachusetts and Connecticut were very slim. There's not enough evidence to separate them, so they all tie for 18th.