D1 Match Recap | Regional Semi Final - Utah Vipers

After winning their SCRFU finals match against Santa Monica, the Surfers were faced with a tough opponent in the Utah Vipers. The Utah Vipers greatly outweighed the Surfers in terms of size, but the Surfers were determined to take up the challenge. Going into the weekend, the Surfers entered the match against the Vipers without their backs captain, Maddie Arenchild, who injured her foot in the last game against Santa Monica, and Talia Carrasquillo, a leader in tackles with the forwards, who was out with a shoulder injury from the game against Santa Monica.

For the Surfers, they had the hardest path to make it to Nationals with multiple playoff rounds and multiple regional games against the previous runner-up in their initial post-season games. Many of the other teams in other regions throughout the D1 league had straight paths to the Nationals, only facing teams that were in their league that they'd easily beaten.

To set the Regionals stage, there was some controversy over who the 4 teams were going to be. Lifewest was originally set to put in a team for that Regionals weekend but dropped out at the last minute because of "not enough qualified players," even though they tried to qualify 8 players in a game against Chico in the 79th minute. These players were notably not present, and even players on that day noted on their social media that they only played with 12 players. There were also conflicting substitutions in Rugby Xplorer with a player going in to sub for 2 players. That player was not present at the time. Multiple teams complained about that fact, and Lifewest was now under investigation by USA Rugby, and nothing else has been heard from the committee since they dropped out from Regionals.

In a scramble to find a 4th team, multiple teams were requested to take the place of Lifewest, including a D2 All Blues team, ORSU who lost to Seattle, and finally Santa Monica who lost to the Surfers. Initially, the Santa Monica team was supposed to be seeded #4 against the Surfers seeded #1 and would have to play the Surfers again in the first round of Regionals, but declined to come if they had to play against the Surfers again after their loss in the SCRFU finals. In order to keep the 4-team bracket, the brackets were set to have the San Diego Surfers face the runner-up National Championship team, Utah Vipers, and Seattle to face Santa Monica. In the game against Seattle, Santa Monica lost to Seattle in a blowout loss 31 - 5.

The Surfers took on a much bigger team on that Friday against the Utah Vipers. Determined to make it to Nationals, the San Diego Surfers fell short by 3 points with a final score of 26 - 29.

It was visually obvious that the San Diego Surfers were a smaller team in both the forward pack and backs. They struggled throughout the game to make their tackles but had great try-saving tackles by Sheree Collins. The first 2 tries came from missed tackles from the Surfers, with Utah putting them up 2 tries to the Surfers. The first try came by Sheree Collins with a little bit of space and a lot of speed to put down a try in the corner and a huge conversion kick by Kaylee Westmoreland.

Jada Blair had a huge run down the sideline from a long pass to put her down close to the try zone. Kaylee Westmoreland completed the try and converted the kick in the final minutes of the first half. The first half ended at 14 - 12, with the Surfers in the lead with hopes to win the game.

The 2nd half kicked off, and Annika Santos took a huge hit off a kickoff resulting in injury to her shoulder and knee. Morgan Bundy took the field as hooker and showed immediate energy off the bench, scoring a try for the Surfers.

A couple more missed tackles resulted in multiple tries for the Utah Vipers. Cathy Cai was able to put down another try to keep the score close. Down again by only 3 points nearing the end of the game, the Surfers kicked the ball over the Vipers' defensive line, and Julia Buescher touched the ball down. The referee was nowhere in sight to make the call for the try and had to rely on the AR, who said it was a try. In the end, the head referee called back the try, and the Surfers lost the ball in a turnover, and the ball was kicked out to end the game.

The final score ended at 26 - 29. The Surfers, always with the goal to make it to Nationals, ended in disappointment, reminiscent of the year before, but with the amount of injuries and effort put into the season, they still had a lot to keep their heads up for.

The ultra-competitive Surfers will always have goals to win it all and have never lost their competitive edge. They plan to keep working to be the best D1 team and will be back next year primed and focused for another great year of rugby. And at the end of the day, the Surfers were able to reconnect after the game, have a great time in Vegas, and a lot of good times that can't be written about here. What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.....