There are 3 weeks left in the regular season with the top 4 teams in each conference entering post season play. Currently in the West, Houston, Seattle and San Diego have clinched playoff spots, in the East, New England and New Orleans have clinched playoff spots. There were 34 Canadian players in action, 17 starters and 17 reserves.
Island Blue won the final match of the 3 game series against Mainland Gold 22-20, winning the series 2 games to 1. All matches in the series were won by the home team.
It’s time to double back on a couple of stories from last week and dig down a bit deeper. The first story is the men’s 7s team getting relegated from the World Rugby 7s series, the second story is the men’s U20 loss to the USA on home soil. Both are connected through a theme of “what’s happening with the national men’s rugby programs”?
MacDowell Rugby have an ambitious schedule this year which provides a great opportunity for U18 and U16 players to get noticed and on the high performance pathway.
It was a similar scenario to Game #1, Canada dominated the scrums, the USA had the advantage everywhere else. Without Canada’s dominance in the set piece the score would have been a lot worse, Canada’s first two tries were penalty tries courtesy of the set piece. The 3rd Canada try was a kick to the corner from Matt Bennett to wing Spencer Cotie.
The Highlanders have added four more Reserve players since our last update. The quality of the Reserve players announced is increasing and the gap between 1st XV and Reserve is closing. Two of the recent Reserve announcements are top level players in the BC Premier, Nick Blain fullback from the championship UBCOB Ravens team and Brian Ndirangu second row from Westshore, both of these players would be interchangeable with their counterparts on the 1st XV. The two other players are Irish and we’re not familiar with their level of play but likely quite handy. Conall Henchy is a hooker from Trinity College, and Andrew Sherlock is a scrum-half from Galwegians.
The Ravens narrowly fell to Mexico National XV in a hotly contested match on a scorching Vallarta day. The squad came together at Vancouver International on Thursday May 17 and boarded the short direct flight to Puerto Vallarta. Full of excitement and with five players from other BC clubs joining the tour, the introductions were out of the way and it was full steam ahead.
Carissa Norsten was named World Rugby Women’s Sevens Series Rookie of the Year, let that sink in a bit. The Men’s Sevens Series Rookie of the Year was Antoine Dupont, a seasoned XVs professional rugby player who some claim is the best rugby player in the world at the moment. How did a young woman from rural Saskatchewan who first touched a rugby ball 5 years ago at age 15 get to share the same honour as a professional rugby player who has played since age 4, professionally since 18, in a country where rugby is a national pastime? The answer may provide a clue as to how Canada is going to compete internationally and develop rugby talent.
Week 14 of MLR wrapped up with 30 Canada-eligible players in action, 15 starters and 15 in reserves. Houston and New England remain top of the West and East conferences. Scoring tries this week were Andrew Coe, Jack Shaw, Andrew Quattrin and Ethan Fryer.
It was a sad day for the men’s 7s program as they lost to Spain 22-14 in the promotion/relegation game and they are out of the series for next year. We’ll cover the ramifications of that in an editorial during the week. Remaining on the series next year are Spain, Uruguay, USA and Kenya. The men now focus on the Olympic qualifier later this month.