Topeka v. Wichita /
Emporia v. Wichita
Shunga Park
Topeka, KS
September 20, 2008
What a great weekend for Wichita Rugby this past weekend was! The club travelled exceptionally well for what we knew would be a lot of rugby on Saturday, and in fact several of us still played as many as 140 minutes over the span of our two matches. Our first Merit Table match of the season pitted us against the home Topeka Wizards, a club who has recently struggled with numbers but appears to be re-building. From the get-go, the Wichita backline used solid passing and exceptional speed to run around their opponents and scored early. The pack retained possession for us all day long and once again dominated the scrums. Wichita scored 12 tries in all and held Topeka scoreless to win by a final score of 70-0. Wichita followed up that performance by beating Emporia State again in much more convincing fashion this time by a score of 62-3. Wichita never allowed a try to be scored against them in either match.
New club member and Kimbo Slice wanna-be Lesley Louis proved to be a real spark for the entire team, always voicing words of encouragement and never tolerating anything less than all-out effort ('WE WIN ALL!!!' echoed throughout Shunga park all day long). Rookie EJ Gianforti top notch and scored not only his first, but also his second try in the 2nd half of the Topeka match. He also played exceptional defense, including a series where he made back-to-back tackles near the Wichita touchline around the 79th minute and never once looked tired. Man of the Match(es) honor was awarded to team captain Tony Fattizzi, who scored another try and was always around the ball in support for what seemed like all 140 minutes he played.
With the exception of Steve hurting his wrist (which we hope will be OK) and yours truly getting heat exhaustion (how I managed to do that while official team Ginger, rookie Nate Dogg, did not is beyond me), we came out of the inaugural Topeka SharkFest tournament unscathed and looking strong.