The week started for Mustang rugby in Las Vegas Thursday Morning with a tough loss in a 7’s match against Bowling Green State University. The next 7’s match took place midday against UCSB that served Cal Poly with another very close loss. The afternoon game against Texas Tech gave the Mustangs a good first win of the day.

Fridays 7’s matches gave the Mustangs a chance to redeem themselves and they took it. The team was matched up against four solid 7’s programs and they were able to win all of the games and end the tournament with a winning record and took home the Plate in the tourney.

The sevens tournament in Las Vegas served as a qualifier for a single spot in the nationally televised sevens tournament that will be taking place in Philadelphia, Pa in June.

The Mustangs played a number of 15’s games this weekend as well. On Saturday the Mustangs matched up against a very tough BYU program. They were defeated 68-8 by the 2009 national champion Cougars.

After a long week the Mustangs also matched up  a mixed squad against ASU who is another program that will be participating in the CPL this year. With many injuries during and before the game the Mustangs went down 45-12.

Cal Poly’s 2^nd side defeated both ASU and UofA’s second side teams with convincing wins.

In a match that boasted many defensive stands and showed strong play by both teams Cal Poly trumped Claremont College 27-10. 
 
The first half went 15 minutes without a score from either side. Many good runs were made but were cut short either by a strong tackle or a loose ball.
 
Cal Poly put the first points up around the 16 minute mark when Dom Ferri made a line break from 20 meters out and made a strong sprint to the try line setting up an easy conversion for Matt Verga to make the score 7-0 to Cal Poly. 
 
A penalty conversion by Matt Verga with 15 minutes left in the first half gave the Mustangs a 10-0 lead.
 
The first half was a pretty dominant show by Cal Poly but many errors were made during attack and when line breaks were made. Claremont showed ability to make good defensive stands and they made it tough for the Mustangs to break the gain line.
 
The second half started with a try scored by Stuart Sharpe followed by a missed conversion. Soon after, Claremont answered back with their first try of the day, making the score 15-5.
 
David Shaefer scored the next points on a strong goal line effort by the Mustangs forward pack (Alex Frost conversion good). Claremont tacked on their second try of the day to make the score 22-10. Cal Poly sealed the game off with a late try by freshman wing Joeti Klein.
 
Cal Poly coach Nick Massman believes there was a lot to improve on from the game.
 
Next up for Cal Poly is the Las Vegas 7’s tournament and a game against BYU over the course of this Thursday, Friday and Saturday. For more information regarding the Las Vegas Rugby event you can visit the official website: http://www.usasevens.com/las-vegas-invitational.aspx.

This Saturday, February 5th, Cal Poly will have two matches against Claremont College at Pennington Fields in Arroyo Grande.

Cal Poly A vs Claremont A at Noon on field 2

Cal Poly B vs Claremont B at 1:30PM on field 1

Players should arrive at 10:30AM ready to play.