State Champs Crowned in Connecticut, Illinois, New York
State Champs Crowned in Connecticut, Illinois, New York
The past week saw several state champions crowned in Boys HS rugby, with New York, Connecticut, and Illinois all seeing championship games.
Here's a roundup:
Illinois
Glen Ellyn ran out to a 24-7 lead and held off Notre Dame de la Salette 36-29 in the Illinois Boys D1 final.
Zane Cross, Dylan Skodal, and Morley Coval led the scoring for Glen Ellyn as they established their lead. However, discipline problems crept in and two concurrent yellow cards to Glen Ellyn put them down to 13 players. La Salette is too smart not to take advantage and they clawed back.
However, once Glen Ellyn was back at full strength, two tries from Joey Pope sealed the game.
Massachusetts HS Finals Finalized
Connecticut
In a thriller Fairfield Prep held off Greenwich HS 33-28. Brice Muller scored two tries for Fairfield with Malachi Mercer-Robinson and Conor Fitzsimons also touching down. As he has all season, Nicolas Vittoria was a points machine, converting four tries and scoring one himself for a personal haul of 13.
In a back-and-forth game that saw the lead change hands several times, Greenwich scored first and seemed to have scored last, also, taking the lead with four minutes left. But with time essentially up, Fairfield got a penalty and kicked to touch. They won the lineout, drove the maul, and Fitzsimons scored with no time left to put his side ahead.
June 10, said Fairfield Head Coach Kevin Kery,, "was an amazing day for rugby in the state of Connecticut, and especially for Fairfield Prep Rugby. Claiming our first state title and defeating a top level program like Greenwich is the culmination of all of the hard work and dedication that members of this team have put in since the beginning of this season, as well as their careers. We leaned on our senior leadership who have spent their careers supporting one another, pushing one another, celebrating every victory and sharing in each defeat: together I am so unbelievably proud of each and every one of these young men and what they have accomplished, both on and off the pitch. They have confirmed, under no uncertain terms, that Fairfield Prep Rugby is not going away anytime soon.”
Greenwich has been the dominant school team in Connecticut for a very long time, so this result certainly has ripples.
In D2, Midstate Rugby beat the Fairfield Rugby Club 18-12.
New York
Xavier HS shut out Pelham HS 47-0 to win the Rugby New York D1 title. The first 15 minutes or so were very close and it was only 3-0 for Xavier midway through the first period. Slowly Xavier began to build on that lead and a converted try made it 10-0 before two more scored put them ahead 20-0.
Xavier did well to hold Pelham and didn't allow them to score and while Pelham's forwards did well in loose play and in set piece, Xavier's execution in the backline was perhaps the different.Prlham opted to give some additional players experience in the final and in the final 10 minutes Xavier ran in four tries to put it away.
For Xavier this was the culmination of a very good season in which they finished 3rd at the HS National Championships and continued to improve through the season. Whenever they saw a player go down they were able to bring in someone else with ability who was also physically able to handle the job. Through the season they beat Pelham, Rye, Fort Hunt, Herriman, St. Ignatius, and Greenwich, and played a very challenging tour of Ireland.
