St. Mary’s University almost made. Through a long 15s season they eventually produced a DIA championship, and then through Saturday at the USA Rugby College 7s Championships in Denver, they were undefeated and in with an excellent chance of winning the Cup.

Then, in one fourteen-minute game, it all went away. The Gaels were undone by injuries, and a very solid performance by Utah in which the Utes dominated phase play.

The game was Utah’s best of the weekend, as they made few mistakes and allowed St. Mary’s very few attacking chances. 

After that, the Gaels went on to defeat AIC 26-5 in a result that was in part due to the Yellow Jackets just hitting a wall. AIC had lost 21-17 on the final play of the game to Lindenwood in a game where they exhausted themselves. Beat up as they were - St. Mary’s star Dylan Audsley played with a broken hand and captain Cooper Maloney also played hurt - the Gaels were fitter and a little faster. So that put St. Mary’s on to the Plate Final, where Bradley Roberts, who had been pressed into many more minutes thanks to the injuries, scored two tries, and Alex Barton scored another in a 17-10 defeat of Arizona State. 

In that game, St. Mary’s led 17-0 at halftime, and grimly hung on.

“We are disappointed,” said Kingsley McGowan. “We wanted to win two championships. Yeah we had injuries but we went 5-1 and we finished 5th. Kind of look back at that Utah game and we know we had some chances.”

St. Mary’s Head Coach Tim O’Brien had Joey Reavey coach the 7s team and Reavey did well, but, he also got a harsh lesson in how fickle and cruel 7s can be. He had to scramble to rejigger his lineup, and he had game which were delayed in the middle due to lightning. And he had to adjust to changing tactics. 

What St. Mary’s accomplished was impressive, beating Colorado State Texas State, and West Virginia by wide margins, and beating AIC fairly comfortably as well as winning a close one over Arizona State. They had one blip, a 14-5 loss to Utah, and it was an excellent example of how 7s tournaments can be about matchups more than anything else. Utah barely lost to Lindenwood, but were crushed by Central Washington in the 3rd-4th game. AIC barely lost to Lindenwood, and yet St. Mary’s beat them by 21.