It’s week 6 of the 11 week regular season, with 3 more weekends of playoff action for the top 6 teams (7 as the Pride aren’t eligible for post season).
The BCRU announced the 2022 Inductees for the BC Rugby Hall of Fame, Ed Fairhurst, Bruce Kuklinski and Julia Sugawara. The BCRU are planning the event for June 2023, no specific date has been announced yet. They’ll be joined by the 2023 Inductees, that nomination process has been extended to March 31, 2023.
[ed. Event link to buy tickets. NOTE: If anyone is interested in doing a donation it will be doubled as the first 250K is being matched by a corporate investor. Donations can be made at the ticket link above.]
An evening with National team coaches, players and supporters to raise funds for Canada’s Women’s U18, U20 and U23 programs.
by Peter MacDonald
On an intact Klahanie pitch with intermittent very light rain falling the Caps looked in mid-season form to start this game coming out of the winter break. The Ravens not so much. Some credit is due to the Ravens though for keeping the score to 15-0 Caps after 15 minutes as the Caps had all the ball and were firing forward pods and quick ball through the backs at them in waves. A saving tackle by Aaron McLelland and some big hits by centre Sean Pyle kept the Caps onslaught from getting completely out of control.
UBCOB Win U18 Title
The 2022 Age-Grade Club Season came to a close this weekend after the U18 Boys Final finished with UBCOB Ravens defeating Salish Sea Warriors 26-17.
Kudos to the Canadian Rugby Foundation for investing in Canadian coaches. Curry Hitchborn, Scott Manning and Andy Evans are the three university coaches from BC. Jamie Mackenzie and Pat Parfrey are former Canadian national team players who are currently coaching at Laurier and Memorial respectively. Ian McLeod played at Western and now coaches there, Ian Baillie grew up in Ontario and coaches at McGill. Congratulations to all.
The men’s Premier restarts this weekend at Week 5. We have the predictions and rosters below. The women’s Premier starts Week 1, we have the matches listed below and will post rosters if and when they’re made available.
We listed below the Canadian players, we believe, who will be playing in MLR 2023. We compiled the list from Wiki and also Americas Rugby News, who seem an up to date source. There are 59 players on the list with Toronto, as expected, having the largest number of Canadians. New England, surprisingly, is amassing an impressive number of Canadians in their roster.
With the second half of the season starting this weekend, it seemed a good idea to do an early preview/review article. Our usual prediction article will be on Friday once we have the rosters in.
The BCRU seem to have their act together this year with a top notch slate of coaches. Leading the senior men’s team is Curry Hitchborn. It’s a no-brainer to have him in charge of the Provincial men’s team as he leads the most successful university program in the country and his UBC team are perennial contenders for the BC Premier title. Phil Mack and Jake Ilnicki are assistant coaches.