Baton Rouge vs. Bay Area RFC 

The Baton Rouge Rugby Club closed out its 2007-2008 season with a hard fought 29 – 14 win over the Bay Area Rugby Club on Saturday at Highland Road Park.  It was a beautiful, but windy, day and a nice crowd turned out for the match.  The Baton Rouge forwards provided some early excitement as they muscled the ball over the Bay Area line on a driving maul off of a line out with Jacob Verret doing the honors of touching down to make the score 5 – 0.  However, Bay Area answered almost immediately as Baton Rouge failed to secure a maul at midfield following the restart and with the turnover, the visitors spun it wide to their backs who found space.  In the ensuing ruck 25 meters from the Baton Rouge goal, the referee judged Baton Rouge to be guilty of an infringement and Bay Area nailed the penalty kick to make it 5 – 3.  Baton Rouge extended their lead to 8 – 3 on a penalty kick by Danny Rosenquist midway through the half, but the Bay Area team had come to play.  With the wind at their backs, their forwards dominated the breakdowns and made their presence felt in the scrums, as well, for the second 20 minutes of the half and Baton Rouge was fortunate to have yielded only another penalty kick which made the score 8 – 6 at the break.

Bay Area took a 9 - 8 lead on a penalty for an offsides violation in the first minutes of the second half.  But that seemed to be the wake up call Baton Rouge needed.  Playing downwind now, Baton Rouge bottled Bay Area up deep in their own end and scored a second try on a driving maul off a line out with Kevin Caliva getting credit for the score.  Rosenquist’s conversion made it 15 – 9 in favor of Baton Rouge with a half an hour to play.  The hosts had the bit between their teeth now and once again pushed deep in the Bay Area end for an extended stay which eventually resulted in a third try, which came off an elusive run by Austin Fussell.  The conversion made it 22 – 9.  Baton Rouge began to go to their reserves to get fresh legs on the park to sustain the pressure and hammer in the final nail, but it was Bay Area which scored against the run of play with eight minutes left to make it a 22 – 14 affair.  However, Bay Area’s kicker missed the tricky conversion in the wind and so it was still a two score margin with time becoming a factor.  Baton Rouge began to kick away possession and use the wind to their advantage to pin Bay Area back. The strategy paid off as Jeff Ruether wove through the defense to seal the deal at 29 – 14. Ruether, Rosenquist, Fussell, Hank Hughes and Craig Gothreaux had strong matches for Baton Rouge in the backs.  The entire Baton Rouge pack figured in two scores, but the back row of Joris van der Ham, Brett Somers and Kevin Caliva were simply outstanding on the day, outworking the Bay Area loose forwards in the final thirty minutes, and were the difference between the two sides.

Bay Area took the B match by a score of 22 – 7.

Baton Rouge ended the season at 5 wins vs 4 losses in the Texas Rugby Union and finished second in the Division II standings.  After an 0 - 3 start, with a couple of tough losses to Division I competition, they won their final four matches and five of their last six. Baton Rouge had an overall record of 11 wins vs 6 losses for the 2007-2008 campaign.  Congratulations to Coaches Brad Hudson and Jim Brugh and Captains Craig Gothreaux and Jason Mapp for strong leadership all year under some very challenging circumstances.

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