The Southwest United Rugby Football Club won the bronze medal at the provincial championship.
The Southwest United Rugby Football Club won the bronze medal at the provincial championship.
Southwest United Rugby Football Club capped a strong season Saturday with a bronze provincial medal.
United won two of three games at Sherring Field in Lethbridge to place third behind perennial champion Winston Churchill Bulldogs and Bowness Trojans.
United opened the tournament Friday with a 55-0 romp over Peace Wapiti Academy of Grande Prairie.
Tasan Perry scored three tries, Rylan Clarke had two and Cole Sawchuk, Charles Florence, Logan Kaack and Shody Perry each had one.
Perry booted two converts and a penalty and Michael McTighe had one convert.
That win advanced United to Friday’s semifinals, where they fell 24-12 to Bowness Trojans from Calgary.
“We were monstrously disappointed in the result,” United coach Craig Patton said. “We simply made too many handling errors, and turned the ball over too many times. We allowed their fly half to make too many yards and set up their other backs for long runs.”
Clarke and Florence had tries for United and Perry converted one.
The loss sent United into the bronze medal match on Saturday morning.
A dominating performance carried United to a 55-0 win over Bow Valley.
“This was as close to a perfectly executed game as we could possibly have
performed,” Patton said. “I was very proud of the boys for coming into this match after a very disappointing semifinal and laying down their best game of the year.”
Bow Valley crossed center just six times and the Cochrane team got inside United’s 22-meter line once.
Clarke led the attack with three tries for 15 points and Tasan Perry had two tries. McTighe had one try and two converts, Florence had a try and a convert, Kaack and Aiden Seguin each had a
try and Shody Perry booted two converts.
“We saved the best performance for the bronze medal match,” Patton said. “We dominated in every aspect of this game from start to finish.”
A punishing attack by the forwards and slick passing by the backs powered United to victory.
“It was too bad that we did not play like this in the semifinal,” Patton said.
