"That was probably one of the best high school rugby matches I've seen in a long time." Those were the words from Xavier of Middletown Coach Mike Toilken after the match on Sunday. His Xavier Falcons had just dispatched Greenwich High, 34-7, in a hard-fought game that was almost penalty free. The loss ended Greenwich's run at an unbeaten season.

Cardinals' tri-captain Geoff Kalan thought that, despite the score, "This was a pretty even game. And they obviously got into the try zone a lot more than we did. Fortunately, we will have an opportunity to see them again in the Northeastern tournament. I know that Coach (Steve) Lapham will have us ready to play."

Lapham, for his part, thought the Cardinals were taken off their game some.

"Whenever we got close we didn't do what we have been doing this year like keeping our heads and working together," he said. "We got a little greedy and tried to get the ball out too far and they were very good poaching the ball off of us. I was surprised that they scored so many points against us. It seemed that this game was won by the tackling; when we were tackling shirts they were tackling legs."

Xavier's Eddie McCaffrey, who scored three of the Falcons trys, thought the

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competition was tough.

"We just did what we had to do," he said. "This was a big game for us. Greenwich is a very good team and we will see them again in the Northeast Tournament. Hopefully we can keep it going and get to the Nationals. "I have to give credit to my outside center Jim Kowalski who set me up with great passes so I could score."

Kowalski was struck by the growing intensity of the rivalry.

"We came and played our hearts out. The Greenwich Xavier rivalry gets

Top, Greenwich High s Spencer Harrison dives to take down a Xavier ballcarrier in Sunday s rugby match at GHS. Above, Greenwich s Mike Martino beats several Falcons to the ball. (Contributed photo)
more intense every year," he said. "This is the third time I have played in this contest and each year it gets more intense. I really have to thank our coaches for getting us ready. We were ready today."

The first Xavier score came 26 minutes, 45 seconds into the 35-minute first half and the conversion after the try, which was scored by Kowalski, was good, making the score 7-0, Tigers.

Fifteen minutes later McCaffrey scored his first try. The point-after failed, but Xavier led, 12-0. The first half ended with the Cardinals down, 12-0, and the match was not out of reach.

But the Falcons scored three more times before Greenwich was able to get on the scoreboard.

With the game virtually over on the scoreboard and the score at 29-0, Kalan scored the only Cardinal try at the 5:15 mark and with the conversion the score was 29-7. Four minutes later Xavier capped off the scoring for the day with 1:53 left in the match, making the final tally 34-7 in favor of the Falcons.

The Cardinals will be the No. 2 seed behind Xavier going into the Northeast tourney. That is when the going gets tough. For a high school rugby team the ultimate goal is to get to play in the national tournament. A new configuration allows only one team from the Greenwich "union" (league) to travel to the National Tournament. Both Xavier and Greenwich will be vying for that coveted position.

"Coach Lapham will have us ready for that rematch," said Cardinals hooker Mike Martino. "Today Xavier came out and did a good job stealing the ball from us and we had some breakdowns in today's game. We will be ready for them next time."

Kalan agreed with his hooker: "Coach will have us ready to play," he said. "We have a lot more rugby to play this year."

"Xavier ran with confidence today and we ran a bit panicked," Lapham said. "We weren't setting up good rucks as we usually do. Hopefully, we can both win our first games in the Northeast tournament and we will get to see them in the finals."

Saturday, the Cardinals will play Staples High of Westport to end their regular season schedule. Then, it is off to the Northeast Tournament and another likely match with Xavier.