A Look at the Pacific Pride Roster for the Fall 2023 Season: First Match Saturday vs UBC
The Pacific Pride aka the Rugby Canada Development Academy kick off their fall season on Saturday against defending Premier men’s champions UBC. That game will be played at MacDonald Park, the JBAA home ground, and kickoff is 2:15pm. The match is part of the Coastal Cup which involves the Academy and the University sides UBC, UVic and TWU. The Coastal Cup schedule is here.
Every fall and spring the Pacific Pride roster changes, new recruits come in the fall, and then some will go on to MLR contracts and national 7s contracts at the end of the fall season and have to be replaced for the spring season. Last year Callum Botchar started the fall season with the Pride, picked up a 7s contract, moved on to XVs with New Plymouth Old Boys in Taranaki and now is part of the Taranaki Development Squad. Max Stewart, the promising #10 from South Africa, picked up a 7s contract as did Elias Hancock who was a mobile #8. Kyle Steeves signed with Dallas of the MLR, Ciaran Breen signed with Toronto, Seth Purdey played with Atlanta.
There are 34 players starting the fall season, some returning from last season and some new faces. Fourteen of the players are age 20 or younger in 2023. The breakdown by region is Ontario 13, BC 11, Prairies 4, Maritimes 4 and Quebec 2.
Pacific Pride Fall 2023
Hooker Sam Mace
Hooker Noah Kyneston
Hooker Austin Creighton
Prop Spencer Cooper
Prop Tyler Matchem
Prop Sam Miller
Prop Aaron Pacha
Lock James Stockwood
Lock Reid Yurkowski
Lock Alistair Bruce
Lock Reid Davis
Lock Karl Hunger
Lock Jaiden John
Back Row Von Richardson
Back Row Ben James
Back Row Matt Klimchuk
Back Row Braden Bruce
Back Row Charles Taimani
Backrow Cody Nhanala
9 Paddy Kirwan
9 Ben Logan
9 Brady White
9 Jesse Kilgour
10 Justin Taylor
10 Mark Balaski
Centre Rhys James
Centre Kyle Tremblay
Centre Noah Flesch
Centre Jack East
Centre Liam Poulton
Back 3 Ian Jones
Back 3 Ben Russell
Back 3 AJ Kosempel
Back 3 James Thiel