The Canadian women’s XVs team will be busy this spring and summer as they prepare for the World Cup in August. They’ve added Ireland as part of the build up, with a note in their news release, “additional match announcements for Canada’s Women’s Rugby Team will be made shortly.”.
The 2024/25 BC Rugby Senior Club Leagues Playoffs have been confirmed with the quarter-finals this coming weekend, April 12th. The semi-finals take place April 26th after the Easter break and the finals are in Abbotsford on Saturday, May 3, 2025. The complete list of times and venues is on the BCRU fixtures page.
Round 8 of MLR saw 20 Canadians in action, 11 starting and 9 in reserves. Mason Flesch and Lucas Rumball scored tries for Chicago in their win over San Diego. Chicago remains top in the East and Houston claims top in the West. Lucas Rumball was named to the MLR Team of the Week.
Thanks to Peter Muirhead who put together these league tables for the weekend of April 5th 2025. This is the final standings with the playoffs set for next weekend April 12th. There may be slight variations as the competition committee hasn’t finalized all matches, for example, Women’s Div 1, JBAA to host #6 but as Bayside has reportedly opted out of the playoffs, United may fill the gap, otherwise JBAA may get a first round bye. Check the BCRU fixtures page for updates on the weekend schedule.
Phil Smith has come up with a great resource for high school rugby on the Island and in BC. It’s a newsletter “Covering High School Rugby on Vancouver Island and British Columbia”. We’ve included a link below to download the full .pdf version which is formatted and includes photos. We’ve also copied some of the text below for a quick read.
Canada finished 3rd in Singapore, losing to Australia in the Cup semi-finals but defeating France in the 3rd place playoff. Canada finish the series in 4th as they prepare for the championship tournament in LA in May. The teams going to the relegation tournament are Brazil, China, Ireland and Spain.
It was the final weekend before the playoffs and now the playoff picture is set. In a surprising turn, UVic defaulted their match at Capilano and we understand Caps will be awarded 5 points. The quarter-finals look to be CW @ Lomas and Caps @ Westshore with Ravens and UBC getting a first round bye. We’ll wait for any final BCRU ruling on the UVic default before calling it official.
It’s always interesting to learn about the BC high school programs, their history and who is leading the programs now. Collingwood just returned from a successful tour to New Zealand and Australia over the spring break. This was their 17th tour and they took 57 players, a junior U16 team and a 1st XV and 2nd XV at the senior level.
If you’re not a regular starter in MLR, can you be considered an automatic for Canada selection? That’s a valid question as Canada looks towards its World Cup qualifier this year. If you’re good enough to get a regular starting slot in MLR, it’s likely you’ll be in contention for national team match selection but that introduces a problem as Canada doesn’t have MLR starters in several key position, the halfbacks, an openside flanker, the centres.
After weeks without sun and with plenty of rain of late this match was moved off the Westshore fields to Cowichan which generously hosted the two teams on short notice. But a soft pitch, on and off rain and a slick ball led to a defensive standoff for much of the game with no try from open play being scored till after 60 minutes.