Over the weekend Schuylkill River hosted a very successful Friends and Family Day in conjunction with Baltimore-Chesapeake. As reported previously, the wife of Norfolk Blues Captain Eric Hagen recently passed away due to a car accident. In an effort to show Eric some support in this difficult time we decided to put together a fundraiser for his children’s college funds. I am happy to report that Baltimore helped promote this event and was fully on-board with our plan.

A good turnout from both sides enabled us to raise approximately $350 from our snackbar and from raffle tickets. A big thank you goes out to Schuylkill River Hall of Famer Alex Yankowsky for handling the food, and for all of the Schuylkill players who donated items for the raffle.

Our goal was to also put forth a great day of rugby in addition to the fundraiser and we did just that winning the D2 match by a score of 17-12 and winning a 38-36 thriller in the D1 match.

Things got off to a slow start for Troop in the D2 match with Baltimore taking an early 12-0 lead in the first half. Baltimore’s flyhalf did a good job of placing his kicks and we were unable to take the ball the length of the field. The guys regrouped at halftime knowing that we would have the wind and sun in our favor for the second half and we were finally able to get the offense going.

Flanker Pat Bellot helped get things started off by crashing the ball out wide before offloading to the wing who was able to pass back inside to Fullback John Hines for the try. Hines added another try, with a conversion from Scrumhalf Tito Callahan, soon afterwards to make it as 12-12 match headed into the final minutes. Quick hands from Callahan, Hines, and Flanker/Center Dave Gross created space for Wing Mike Centanni to score the match winning try.

The Man of the Match was John Hines and other strong performers included Flyhalf Ryan Tower, Centanni, Hooker Ian Glatts, and Lock Andrea Fatatis.

Scorers:
Tries: Hines (2), Centanni (1)
Cons: Callahan (1)

The Exiles match was a high scoring affair from the get go with Balti’s #5 scoring an early intercept try that was matched by a try from Prop Ricky Schneider. Balti’s 8man, former Schuylkill 7s player Tyler Barberi, was able to break some tackles en route to giving Balti a 12-7 lead which was matched by a rare pick and go try from Center Chino Deal.

Balti then worked it to the corner for a score followed quickly by Brian Keown dragging a defender 20 meters for a try to make it 19-19. Things got a bit dicey for the Exiles from here when Balti’s #22 came on in the second half and really made a big difference as Balti was able to score 3 quick tries to take a 36-19 lead.

To their credit Schuylkill River showed the sort of guts and determination that you expect to see in Philadelphia rugby and were able to answer back. Cody Bukowski righted the ship by tightroping the sidelines to make it 36-24 and Ben Janssen took it from there. Janssen collected a wayward lineout in the offensive zone and scored to make it 36-31 and then he cut back against the grain out wide to find space and score a try to make it 36-36 with 12 seconds to play.

Brian Keown then lined up the conversion kick and put it right down the middle to give Schuylkill a 38-36 lead. Brian deserves a lot of credit not just for this kick but for all of the preparation that led up to it. In addition to practicing his kicking at training every week Brian frequently shows up a couple of hours before he needs to be at the field in order to get extra kicks in. The hard work paid off on Saturday.

Ben Janssen caught the ensuing kickoff and Fullback turned Scrumhalf Pat Boyle was able to boot it out of bounds to give Schuylkill a bonus point victory.
The Man of the Match was Ben Janssen with other strong performances from Brian Keown, Cody Bukowski, Tyler Kelly and Chino.

Scorers:
Tries: Janssen (2), Bukowski (1), Keown (1), Chino (1), Schneider (1),
Cons: Keown (4)

Season Scoring Tally
Troop
Tries: Tito Callahan (2), John Hines (2), John Sneh (2), James Brunson (2), Michael Bacon (1), Pat Bellot (1), Mike Centanni (1), Josh Marchisio (1) Yuriy Trimba (1), Matt Tyris (1)
Cons: Greg Mininger (2), Ryan Tower (2). Tito Callahan (2)
Pens: Ryan Tower (1)

Exiles:
Tries: Ben Janssen (4), Rick Schneider (4), Cody Bukowski (3), Rich Casey (3), Ryan McHugh (3),Pat Boyle (2), Roman Lowery (2), Chino Deal (1), Brian Keown (1), Joe Midwig (1), Jim Rosato (1), Matt Tyris (1)
Cons: Brian Keown (13) Matt Chiaramonte (4)
Pens: Brian Keown (3)