Ten teams gather at the Mid-Atlantic RCT in Pittsburgh in a hugely competitive Boys select-side competition.

We’ve previewed Florida and Indiana in more detail, but there are plenty of other teams with the potential to win.

Florida wasn’t given much of a chance last year, and yes the Juice came away with the trophy. 

Somewhat under the radar, the Empire NY team has already won a tournament, beating Western New York and Capital District/Vermont to take the New York State all-star tournament. However, they are not deep.

“The boys performed really well last weekend, traveling upstate with just 16 players,” said Empire Coach Mark Griffin, whose team has struggled to get numbers thanks in large part to how long the season goes now. But the core of the team has been working with Griffin through early may, and that, added the coach, “has enabled them to gel and get comfortable with the basic game-plan framework.”

So playing two tough - albeit shortened - games could stress the New Yorkers.

Then there’s 2014 runners-up Virginia.They got a warmup with a scrimmage against Maryland, and perhaps the biggest issue for them is the fact that the JV/U17 team that has won in Pittsburgh the last two years is now the Varsity team. So the JVs are inexperienced, and might struggle, but the Varsity team is still young but has seen it all before. Two-time JV MVP Dmontae Noble, the Warrenton speedster, is now on the Varsity team, so defenses be warned. 

“The work we’ve done with the EIRA program has really helped us,” said Virginia manager Dale Roach. “We feel we’re developing an HP program now.”

Virginia’s preparation has been solid and so has Florida’s. They have several teams that could give them a run, with New Jersey, Indiana, and Pennsylvania also providing plenty of competition.

It’s hard to know if Indiana has their best possible combinations, and as we’ve seen, the long season can sometimes make it tough to get the right team put together. With that in mind, Florida must come in as favorites - their selection process and preparation are as good any anyone’s, and the Juice won last year, too.  

The Southern California Boys RCT is tiny - only three teams - but they could be three of the best select sides in the country.

Northern California has one of the deepest pools of players to draw from (worth noting that Rugby NorCal topped 5,000 players this year), and much of the NorCal team playing in Bakersfield this weekend beat the English Lambs touring side in March. But the Northern California program often struggles to get all of the area teams to buy in, and finding unity. Washington has an excellent history of getting a unified team approach and their power up front is as good as anyone’s. 

But for us, Southern California is the team to beat. Playing at home has helped the Griffins as they don’t have to worry about travel expenses keeping a player home. The SoCal backline is almost entirely HS All Americans and EIRA top performers. Their back row is outstanding, and in the open field the SoCal forward is superb. 

So it comes down to ball control. Washington won the Great Northwest Challenge in 2014 over SoCal by controlling the ball in the rucks, and not allowing sloppy turnovers to give soft tries to the Griffins.

This needs to be the what happens again for the Loggers to win. They are not as dynamic as Southern California, and on paper often not as big as Northern California. But the unity is there. NorCal’s disparate conglomeration of athletes has enormous potential, but we’re thinking this might be SoCal’s time.

In the Rocky Mountain Challenge, many remember how Louisiana came from nowhere to win that tournament several times. It’s unlikely that will happen this year. Colorado wants to win this - a frustrating rarity for them, and Utah wants to repeat.

We feel like Oklahoma has an excellent chance to shock some people at this event, while Texas is also taking a very strong team. Utah v Oklahoma in the opening round is a big game, and the winner might well go on to win the whole thing. Utah has some excellent players, especially up front, and could be able to physically overpower a lot of opponents. 

Last year Heart of America was a bit of a surprise team, but they will have their hands full against Minnesota. We’re thinking Utah (or maybe Oklahoma), Texas, and Colorado should be teams to watch.

In New England, Greenwich/Fairfield are in a strong position to win over Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Capital/Vermont.

In the South, we like North Carolina, partly because of the depth of their player pool, and Arkansas is ready to make a state nationally - more than on the school team level, this event does that for them. Tennessee has a relatively buttoned-down preparation, but has struggled to get all the players they want to see try out. So they remain a question-mark. Maybe the Tri-Stars will feel they have something to prove.