The Tropical 7s wrapped up on the weekend in Tampa, Florida. It’s a popular tournament for Canadian teams although there was a drop off this year by about a third, 33% less Canadian teams made the trip south. There were 48 Canadian teams in 2026 compared to 72 Canadian teams in 2025. In 2025 Canadian teams won six divisions compared to three in 2026.
The PWR are on a break until the end of May when they’ll resume Round 17. There will be two rounds of play and then the playoffs among the top four. This is a recap of the Round 16, the last round before the international break. There were 13 Canadian players with Exeter having a bye. Sophie de Goede finally got on the field after a prolonged recuperation period, she played the last quarter of the match. Julia Schell is still missing from the roster, we did some digging on that and saw this announcement from the Trailfinders in November after Round 5 “we can confirm that Julia Schell has sustained injuries to her anterior cruciate ligament in last weekend’s fixture against Saracens.” All the best to Julia on her recovery. We marked below beside each player a XVs or 7s to denote whether they were selected for the Pacific Four XVs or the Hong Kong 7s. Fourteen players were selected for Pacific Four and four players for Hong Kong 7s.
I dropped by Windsor Park today to catch the Canada U20 camp intrasquad match, Black v Silver. Team Black won handily, they were ahead at the half but poured it on in the second half when the subs came on. A lot of nervous play as players were keen to impress but sometimes tried to do too much themselves. Team Black adapted better to the team play and scored some nice tries, especially in the second half. There apparently will be a tour to South America, possibly in October, but that’s just tentative right now. Both USA and Fiji have been promoted to Tier 1 U20 so it scuppers the Oceania U20 tournament and the traditional home/away with the USA. I posted 44 photos to facebook, embedded below.
While the coastal leagues in BC wrap up their season in May, the interior leagues just get started. About 32 clubs in the Greater Vancouver/Lower Mainland area and Vancouver Island compete in seven leagues from September to May. Kamloops and Kelowna from the Thompson/Okanagan region are the outliers in those competitions. There are 10 teams that compete from May to August in what has been known as the Saratoga Cup. Those teams are from the Okanagan, Kootenays and Central Interior regions. Such is the reality of climate in BC where southern coastal regions get a winter climate similar to NZ/UK while the interior gets a traditional Canadian winter.
Alberta returns as a favourite hosting choice for Rugby Canada, it hosted all three Canada matches last year. Calgary hosted the World Cup qualifier against USA in 2025, the win vaulted Canada into the 2027 World Cup. Edmonton hosted matches against Belgium and Spain in 2025, both losses, so hopefully Edmonton will taste victory this year as Portugal and Spain visit.
The Ravens made a long trek through Nanaimo to Langford keen to play their first game in four weeks and face a strong Westshore team at Juan De Fuca Park. It wasn’t a masterpiece, but the visitors put up three tries (two converted) and a penalty goal to the hosts three tries (one converted) to take the win.
The 2025-26 season is over for the Pacific Pride and some are asking, will they return next season? They’ve had their worst season since returning in 2019. They only had a single round of games in the BC Premier and ended up with 1 win, 1 draw and 7 losses. They were emphatically defeated by visiting teams in exhibition matches. Their coach was assigned to the men’s 7s mid-season. Less games, less wins, less funding, less coaching, the momentum seems to be running out. We’ve heard the rumours, the program is under review, that comes from credible sources. Then yesterday we heard from someone talking to a parent of a returning player, “We have heard the Pacific Pride are no more”. We don’t know that for sure, but the smoke/fire thing, everyone in the community has heard the program is under review but it’s just conjecture at this point what the outcome will be. We asked Rugby Canada for information, but as usual it will come when they’re ready to make an announcement.
The KRC Senior Women versus Bayside was the lone fixture at Exhibition Park this weekend after the Ridge Meadows Men forfeited to the KRC Men in Division 2 action.
Under a sunny blue sky, Aliyah Rodominski kicked off to the awaiting Sharks, who faced immediate Raider pressure. Both squads swapped possession in the early minutes with the Raiders making territory gains through the strong carries of Thea Flundra and Milena Chambers. The Raiders continued to attack on both sides of the field with wingers Rhayna Silversides and Lily Watkinson both getting carries and testing their opposition early in the game. Small errors by the Raiders allowed the visiting Sharks moments to clear their lines and move the play back towards the halfway line.
Canada’s men’s 7s team have ended their season with a 5th place finish in São Paulo. They finished 6th overall in the six team SVNS 2 series, the top four teams advance to the SVNS Championship series. The teams advancing are USA, Germany, Kenya, Uruguay. Canada only won two matches over 15 games in the three tournament series.
Week 17 wrapped up and there’s one weekend left in the regular season. The Ravens look certain to finish top of the table and UBC 2nd. Westshore have a lock on 3rd while Caps and Bays are still in a battle for 4th/5th and home field in a possible rematch. Vikes and Burnaby now tied in 6th/7th but Vikes have one extra make-up match weekend. Lots to be decided after the Easter break. In women’s Premier the Thunderbirds are hitting their stride as the playoffs loom and they look to defend their title.