Severna, MD.  The SJRFC Devils received a cold slap in the face from MARFU D-II South playoff bound Severn River RFC going down in embarrassing form, 34-0.  The SJRFC “B’s” side pulled off another exiting come from behind victory and narrowly defeated SRRFCs “B’s” 26-25.  

1^st Half

Although it sloped down hill a bit, the Devils felt privileged to play on Severn River’s newly constructed playing field complete with proper midfield grading, irrigation, new sod, lights on the way: This field would be the only enjoyable thing about the A-game for the Devils. It all started with sustained Severn River offensive and defensive pressure to start the match that led to a poorly executed Devils clearance kick attempt to the far side touchline. The low yet short kick was fielded on the fly by the Severn River winger who began a threatening counter attack.  A sure try was saved by corner flagging Devils but the ensuing support play by Severn River led to a penalty kick at 4:30.  At 12:00, Severn River put together their only well executed try on the day, going weak after a series of phases.  The conversion was wide.  For the next 24 minutes, play went back and forth with no clear advantage held by either team.  At 36:00, a well placed kick and cover put a ton of pressure on the Devils right winger. He fielded the kick well but then unwisely attempted a difficult pass backward in the tackle that was wrestled away from fullback Bill Blauvelt by a Severn River support player.  Blauvelt appeared to be making a try saving single leg takedown but failed to bring him down. The conversion was wide.  Half time score 13-0

2^nd Half

Down only 13-0,  the Devils were fully confident that they could get back in the game; unfortunately, Severn River wasn’t cooperating. From their ensuing kickoff, they forced play inside the Devils 22 and stayed there with the Devils solidly defending for 10 straight minutes.  After all that work and getting their own scrum, an errant hook out the back of a Devils scrum and lack of urgency to recover the ball led to a Severn River converted try to make it 20-0 at 50:00.  The good news: youngsters Alex Diaz  and Berger Brotz have around 15 playing years left to figure out what happened and hopefully learned a valuable lesson; the bad news-it deflated the Devils after ten hard minutes of tough defending.  At 53:00 another disaster struck: A nearly off side Severn River center cherry picked an ill advised pass from very slow ball and ran it in 40 yds. for a converted try.  The pissed off Devils played some hard, angry rugby for the next 15 minutes, passing on several penalty kicks to avoid the shutout in favor of going for trys.  However, at 67:00 another Devils crucial turnover in a maul allowed a Severn River flanker to sneak out and break away for another converted try through several missed tackles.  The last 13 minutes saw Severn River try to take advantage of the beaten Devils with some dominating back play; however, nobody gave up and the score remained at 34-0.     

Coaches Comments:

Even though the score indicated a blow-out, it didn’t play that way on the field. We gave them 4 trys (three converted) and a penalty kick- 29 points.  The only dominating factor about Severn River was the flyhalf controlling the flow of the game by tactical kicking; ie., putting pressure on the Devils back three….. We had four tactical kicks (one was a grubber) in the game to Severn River’s 11…… Also-we lost 3 crucial balls against the head and were called (incorrectly) for feeding three times, leading to 6 turnovers from our own scrums, some of which were in threatening attacking positions.…..We had no less than 8 failures to control our own lightly contested line-outs with no wind and we allowed them to consistently win their own….  Tight forward play was dominated by Midgely and Lina but we never took advantage of the platforms they set.  Severn River may have had better backs on the day; however, they didn’t really get going until the last 15 minutes and their back three was never placed under pressure….  Bottom line:  Very costly mental and physical errors through-out the game set conditions that didn’t allow success...in other words-we finally played a decent team, played like shit and beat ourselves.       

Devils scoring:
Trys- 0
Conversions-0
Penalty Kicks-0 

1. Peligrino
2. Midgely
3. Diaz, T 
4. Lina
5. Martinez
6. Graf
7. Eykin
8. Brotz
9. Diaz, A
10. Stom
11. Ferrari (Hazwetzwe)
12. Band
13. DiRomualdo 
14. Rimositis
15. Blauvelt

Man of the Match: Chris Lina

Killer “Bs”

Without players willing to make the two hour drive to play in the B-Game, the Devils “B’s” consisted of their A-side playing a second match.  The only fresh legs were Will Barry at right wing, Bill Wilson at flanker and Joe Lynch at lock.  Severn River had a near full B-side and took advantage right away, scoring three unconverted trys in the first 15 minutes.  The Devils sucked it up and countered with Chris Lina and Mike Eykin trys with a Ferrari conversion on the Lina try making it 15-12 at the half. 

Nchymunya then shocked the Severn River crowd by taking a weak side attack around the corner and about seventy blazing yards for a try between the posts. Ferrari converted.  Severn River countered back with two quick unconverted trys.  With the game on the line and time running out, Will Barry took a pass on the wing at an impossible angle and showed some pace of his own touching down in the corner.  Tom “Money” Ferrari hit the very difficult side line conversion  giving the Devils the one point win.  Well done boys!!!

Devils scoring:

Trys- Mike Eykin, Lina, Hazwetzwe, Barry 
Conversions:-(3) Ferrari
Penalty Kicks: none 

1. Graf
2. Pelligrino
3. Diaz
4. Martinez
5. Lynch
6. Midgely
7. Wilson
8. Lina
9. Brotz
10. Ferrari
11. Hazwetzwe
12. Band
13. Diromualdo
14. Barry
15. Stom (Blauvelt)