New England Championships - Newport, RI

NORTH SHORE 10 -- SOUTH SHORE 5

Driving cold rain, high winds and chilly air were the scenery for the greatest moment in the history of our club. The match began on South Shore Anchors' kick-off, and the Steamers took over the game from the start. Within minutes, South Shore had learned the joys of a crunching Steamer tackle and getting pushed in the scrum, ruck and maul. They tried crashing their big men but Mark Swan, newcomer Zac Cook, Scott Marcoulier and Marcel Philippe formed an impassable wall; in the loose, the roving Cam Williams, Chris LeBlanc and Bill Brady harried the opposing halfbacks and generally denied South Shore any continuity. From the start, the Steamers parked themselves within their opponents' 22 meters and it became clear that South Shore would not be able to match the North Shoremen's intensity. From this position, the Steamers scored two tries, the first by speedster Scott Marcoulier and the second by "Iron Man" Chris LeBlanc, both about ten meters from the South Shore left touch line. Yours truly botched the first conversion and Marcel Philippe came close on the second. The South Shore scrumhalf left with an injury and this spelled doom for the Anchors, as the replacement was unable to provide clean ball to the back line off the set pieces. South Shore finally awoke, however, and got a try towards the end of the first half after a series of silly penalties within our 22 meters.

The rain ceased as the first half ended and the Steamers continued to dominate the proceedings until halfway through the half when South Shore began to advance the ball close to the Steamers' goal line. They continued reveiving many penalty kicks but in their eagerness to score tries the South Shore captain invariably chose to run the ball -- a mistake since they could easily have scored 9 points on penalty kicks in the second half but by running the ball even within the North Shore 22 they became easy prey to our tackling and rucking. The game ended on a great rolling maul began by the Venerable Liam Brady . . . it was a beautiful thing to see and the ball did not come out until the referee asked us to "use" it.

North Shore formed as follows: Tom Moloney, Matt Richard and Steve Moloney; Jesse Wilson and Ken Spinale; Chris LeBlanc and Cam Williams (capt.); Liam Brady; Gus del Puerto (capt.) and Zac Cook; Mark Swan, Scott Marcoulier, Reade Morrison and Rob Moran; Marcel Philippe.


NORTH SHORE 0 -- SEACOAST 12

This match was indeed much closer than the scoreline indicates. We kept Seacoast scoreless until the last minute of the first half, when they played the ball from side to side until their fullback overlapped and broke through to our left. They had tried two penalty kicks and a drop kick early in the first half, all of which they missed, in a clear effort to put us away as early as possible. Soon, however, the Seacoast boys realized that they were in for a real match. The score as the half ended stood at 5-0 for Seacoast.

Unable to run through us like they did in our last meeting, they began to resort to trickery in the scrum which the referee was quick to put an end to. With a fair scrum, North Shore stole several Seacoast put ins (credit here goes to Matt Richard and to Steve Moloney who hooked many a ball) and pushed them back at will. Whereas the first half saw a lot of heroic defending from the North Shore (in one instance they took a penalty inside our 22 and as they tried to run the ball in their ballcarriers hit a red-white-blue wall, which prompted the referee to turn around towards me and comment "that was great defending -- you stopped them cold"), as the second half progressed the Steamers dictated the play. Although Seacoast did run in another try which was converted, in the second half, thereafter the Steamers parked themselves well inside Seacoast territory and threatened to break through. Rob Moran had a try disallowed (wrongfully, says the consensus), and Tom "Fish" Moloney came within inches of touching the ball under the posts after driving through the entire Seacoast pack on a penalty ten meters from the Seacoast goal line. However, the official scoreline remained 12-o and that is how this semifinal ended. Despite the defeat, some of the best rugby this club has ever played happened during that second half; we were winning rucks, playing third phase rugby, and playing stifling defense throughout. On the set plays, we pushed them at will.

After the game, there was a touching moment when Terry Townsend (by now the official godfather of this team) gathered us around him and said (to paraphrase) that he was prouder of us than of his own club for the great game we had given Seacoast and for the monumental progress we have made in four months -- and then he gave Sammy fifty bucks so that the club could have a pint each on him. Seacoast president and NERFU Men's Division III director Bob Winchester also came and told me that what we had just done in terms of putting together a great rugby side in a few months is nothin short of unbelievable. Too bad Coach Dan wasn't there to take the credit!

North Shore formed thus: Tom Moloney, Matt Richard and Steve Moloney; Jesse Wilson and Ken Spinale; Chris LeBlanc and Sammy Benson (Liam Brady); Cam Williams (capt.); Gus del Puerto (capt.) and Zac Cook; Mark Swan, Scott Marcoulier, Rob Moran and Eric Cushing (Aaron Bigmore); Marcel Philippe.