The Fraser Valley won Gold in a come from behind victory over Vancouver Island who were leading 14-0 at the half with the Valley coming back to claim a 15-14 win. Fraser River won Bronze.
There were four conference semi-finals taking place over the weekend, 5 of the 8 teams have Canadian players in the roster with 20 players participating. New England Free Jacks have the largest number of Canadian players dressed with 9 representing, Dallas have 4, DC have 3, Chicago have 3 and NOLA has 1.
The Vancouver Highlanders defeated the German National Team 30-26 at the Burnaby Lake rugby club with an estimated 400 people in attendance.
BC claimed a four game sweep of the visiting Eagle Impact Rugby Academy (EIRA) with another set of wins on Saturday.
There will be 5 match days as the WXV 1 tournament comes to Vancouver in September and October. The tournament features the top women’s teams in the World, competing at the tournament will be #1 England, #2 NZ, #3 Canada, #4 France, #7 USA, #10 Ireland. There will be 6 games at BC Place and 3 games at Willoughby Stadium in Langley. Tickets go on sale on July 25th.
With the Vancouver Highlanders hosting the national German team on Saturday, July 20th, at Burnaby, we decided to take a look at some history between German Rugby and Canadian Rugby.
Canada haven’t beaten a team ranked in the top 20 of the World Rugby Men’s Rankings since they defeated USA 34-21 in September 2021. Romania were ranked 20th (63.59) and Canada 22nd (60.90), this win bumps Canada up to 21st place in the rankings (61.87) which will overtake Chile (61.12). Even if Chile defeats Belgium this weekend they’ll still be knocked down to 22nd place (61.39). Romania will retain 20th spot although dropping to 62.62 in the ranking index.
The BCRU announced their 2024 Hall of Fame Inductees, which included Chris Tynan, Eddie Evans, George Puil, Gary Fumano, Ian Hyde-Lay, Rod Holloway, William Turpin. The event will occur in the fall with dates to be announced.
Canada have named their 13 athletes for Rugby 7s at the Olympics. Only the women’s team are representing, the men didn’t qualify. One of the big stories not mentioned in the official release is that Sophie de Goede tore her ACL in training and the injury took her out of the selection pool. On the good news front Carissa Norsten has recovered from her injury and was selected for the team.
The Provincial Regional Championships for U18, U16 and U14 age groups wrapped up on Sunday with the Island taking four titles and Fraser Valley claiming two.