By Jeff D'Andrea

Dragons off to the ‘ship Saturday, whop Wallabies 89-0

Jun 6, 2012 | 9:47 PM

After an emphatic 89-0 semifinal win over the Saskatoon Wallabies Wednesday, the Saskatchewan Rivers Dragons high school rugby club has a chance to win their second ever North Saskatchewan High School Rugby Union championship on Saturday.

A win would mark their first championship since 2008.

The Prince Albert squad scored a whopping 15 tries at Prime Minister’s Park against the Wallabies to advance to the finals. Standoff Clayton Johnson scored four tries and made seven converts. Dylan Folmer and James Thorpe each had three tries and Graham Pedersen had two.

The Dragons will next play for the league final on Saturday against the winner of Friday’s contest between the second place All-Blacks and the third place Harlequins, both based in Saskatoon.

“We have to be very confident, not over confident or cocky,” said Dragons head coach Paul Roy about his team’s approach into the finals. “We feel pretty good, we’re peaking, especially our forwards, at the right time this year.

SIGA

SIGA and Northern Lights Casino main sponsors of the 31st PAGC Fine Arts Festival

10h ago

Workplace incident

City of Prince Albert pleads guilty to workplace safety violation, handed fines

11h ago

Lighting it up

P.A.'s Zablocki leads Regina to victory on Day 4 at Esso Cup

Apr 24, 2024

“The guys have a good team feel right now, a couple of these road trips we had, especially the one in last weekend in Regina, it was good for team unity and brought guys together.”

As to who the Dragons will end up play, Roy said it’s doesn’t really matter.

“We’re expecting a tough game, whoever we play,” said Roy.

The Dragons have outscored both teams by a significant margin this season, the 39-5 over the All-Blacks and 66-10 over the Harlequins, but the Dragons know regular season stats do not mean a whole lot in the playoffs.

The defending champion All-Blacks have been perennial winners in the NRSU and historically have given the Dragons fits over the years.

“They have always had a strong team and usually have had the advantage on us, this is a little bit different that we’ve finished ahead of them this year,” said Roy. “They always have a good pack, always, always.”

As for the Harlequins, Roy said they have really come along quickly in a short period of time. After the Dragons beat them 47-5 on May 8 at home, their second game was much closer May 29 on the road as the Dragons won that by a 19-5 score.

“The Harlequins are really an improved team this year, we played them a couple times and they were a completely different team the second time, they were bigger, stronger, faster and more organized than they were in the first match,” said Roy.

With that being said, the Dragons have improved as the season has gone on as well. After relying on their backs to produce, the forward play has made significant improvements late in the season.

Roy singled out forward Andrew Carswell, an unsung hero of sorts that doesn’t usually make the scoresheet, but is very important to the Dragons’ success and has drastically improved this season.

“He’s turning into an excellent forward,” said Roy. “He doesn’t get mentioned on paper, he doesn’t score tries but he does everything else well.”

The Dragons will play for the league final on Saturday in Saskatoon at 1:30 p.m..

jdandrea@panow.com

@jeff_dandrea