Phil’s Volume 2 Issue 5 covers the Island’s XVs scene, the Island XVs rankings and the schedule for April. The newsletter is posted below.
Some important dates for high school rugby are as follows:
XV’s or 7’s Team Declaration Deadline: April 22nd, 2026
Zone Championships Completed: May 19th, 2026
2026 Rugby XVs & 7s Provincial Championships: May 27-30
A longer than planned bus trip from United to Kamloops resulted in a delayed kickoff to the BC Women’s Division 1 action this past Saturday.
Thankfully it was a sunny day at Exhibition Park, and after the delay, the KRC Senior Women kicked off to the visiting United Rugby Club.
It wasn’t ideal playing conditions, a water logged field, driving rain and a weather delay due to lightning but Canada managed to score four tries for a bonus point while keeping Australia off the board. It wasn’t champagne rugby but Canada’s defence got the job done. Outstanding for Canada were Justine Pelletier at scrum half, Julia Omokhuale in the second row, Pam Buisa at flanker and Brittany Kassil at loosehead prop.
It’s the last regular season weekend, there’s one make-up weekend before the playoffs with UVic hosting Ravens on April 18th. The playoffs start April 25th. The results this weekend created two ties in the standings and the tie-breaking rules had to be consulted, head to head results comes first. That puts UVic in the playoffs and Burnaby out, it also gives UBC 2nd place and Westshore 3rd. In women’s Premier UBC dominated and finish in 3rd, Westshore drop to 4th and Burnaby claim 2nd, Lomas remain #1.
In 2025, MLR was an 11 team North American league. In 2026, it is a six team American developmental league. Following Canada’s 34-20 victory over the Eagles last summer, the rules changed, the borders closed, and the 46-player Canadian contingent from 2025 has been reduced to a mere nine. Only Chicago now has a significant Canadian presence with four players, Seattle and New England have two, and Old Glory has one. California and Anthem have zero. Over Week 1 & 2 only 5 Canadian players saw the pitch. Last year we kept a 46 player spreadsheet of Canadian players, this year it doesn’t merit documentation.
Phil’s Volume 2 Issue 4 covers the Island’s XVs scene, the Island XVs rankings and the schedule for April. The newsletter is posted below.
Some important dates for high school rugby are as follows:
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.