Saturday April 30th – Burnaby Lake Rugby Club hosted three fixtures in what turned out to be a sunny spring day at the lake. The premier women continued their winning ways with a hard earned 34-5 win against an always tough United side. The third division men played a game SFU side and battled their way to a 23 – 15 victory. In the men’s first division game the boys came away with a titan effort to seal the deal with minutes left to win 22-20 against a well drilled CW side.
The women’s team came away with a win to advance them into next weeks finals. Tries came from Laura Harmse, Deb Capps, Lindsay Bernrot, Corinne Jacobsen, Melissa Miyazaki and Maria Gallo.Julia Sugawara chipped in two conversions.
In the men’s third division tries were scored by Scott Breadon, who dragged a defender into the endzone to score and Denis, the juice, Marsten (with a “t”) who beat four defenders before scoring
. Young Nolan Shelley chipped in 2 conversions and 3 penalty kicks in the win. Great games by Marvin Omaque, Walter Homewood, Kelly Hirakida, Craig McLaughlin and Joe Lee putting on some veteran jogging skills.
The men’s first division match was a classic. A low scoring affair in the first half was followed by CW streching to a considerable lead mid way through the second half. Down by a considerable margin with time running out, the Burnaby Coaching staff brought on strategic substitutions, Nolan Shelly and Aaron Reed of the third division. Burnaby’s offence would slowly gain momentum as the young Shelley chipped away at the lead. With minutes remaining Burnaby pulled within a try’s reach of CW before the Vancouver Islanders again stretched the lead to eight. But again Burnaby chipped within a try, and upon the ensuing restart pulled off an amazing possession that saw the ball spun round the pitch and up the sideline before being fumbled backwards and cleared down the field by CW. Burnaby without hesitation again build upon a series of phases that culminated with Angus Fisher drawing two defenders before passing to Isaac Bainivalu who sidestepped two more before scoring under the posts. Nolan Shelly would cooly slot the winning points. Burnaby would clear the ball out of bounds in the dying minutes and go on to win 22-20. Great games by Alec Douglas, Aaron Goddard, Cory Turkington, Paul Murphy and Adam McClusky.
Thank you to United, SFU and CW for three hard matches, and a great day of club rugby! Thanks to the match officials and to the supporters.
Next week the women’s second division team will take on Ridge-Meadows in their semi-final. The women’s Premier team will take on Velox in their Championship. The third div men will take on the Kats in their semi-final and the first division men will take on James Bay in their championship.
