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2010 Mayor’s Cup Rugby Champions Crowned: Mayor’s Cup Rugby Festival A Huge Hit!
Canarsie High School Boys & South Bronx Girls take inaugural PSAL Championships, IS392 representing Romania and Epiphany School representing Ireland, win third Mayor’s Cup Middle School and Elementary School Championship Titles.
June 8, 2010 (New York City, NY) – The NYC Mayor’s Cup Rugby Festival this past Saturday, June 5th did not disappoint. Over 1000 people made the journey out to Randall’s Island under bright blue skies that brought humid heat but thankfully without rain, where 56 teams competed in nearly 120 matches for the coveted City Championship titles.
The event now in its third year and sponsored again by HSBC Bank USA, N.A. (HSBC) continued to build upon past year’s success. A colorful opening ceremony showcasing 32 different national-themed jerseys and boasting bagpipers courtesy of the American Scottish Foundation and a Didgeridoo courtesy of the Australian Consulate General engaged the audience prior to the US Marine Corp’s presentation of the colors. The National Anthem was then sung perfectly by High School student Kiara Rodriguez before the players were sent off to their fields for a 15 minute early opening match kick off at 9:45am.
72 pool games were hotly contested on 12 fields prior to 11:30am at which point the administrators carefully seeded the teams for the playoffs. The playoffs consisted of a Cup, Plate, Bowl & Shield for elementary and middle school players enabling all teams a chance to win some silverware.
After the quarter finals 32 elementary and middle school teams remained in the running for the semis and took a welcome break to watch the inaugural Public School Athletics League Championship Finals which were contested in both boys’ and girls’ divisions between South Bronx Educational Campus and Canarsie Educational Campus (Brooklyn). Both games showcased some great rugby considering the students had only picked up a rugby ball for the first time just 7 weeks prior. The Canarsie Boys got the better of South Bronx on the day however, with a 20-0 win (in rugby you get 5 points for a “try” – similar to a touchdown in Football). There were no conversions (field goals) for this first Championship. The result was almost reversed for the girls whereby South Bronx defeated the Canarsie girls albeit with a late Canarsie fight back which resulted in a try to leave the final score 20-5.
At the middle school level the Plate, Bowl and Shield trophies were lifted by PS328 representing Kenya, Riverdale Community Center representing the USA and PS223 representing Canada. They defeated IS113 (Spain), School of the Future (South Africa) and PS52 (China) respectively. All games were tightly fought encounters with no winning margins being more than 1 or 2 Trys apart.
