Wednesday's Ruck & Maul

April 22, 2026 Posted in News / Victoria BC / Rugby Club / Prems / Men's Reserve Div / CW Rugby / B.C. Rugby / Community / Fifteens / Senior Women / Senior Men

Divvies Vs Comox

EVERY CLOUD HAS A SILVER LINING.

This weekend sees the commencement of playoffs for the BCRU titles in the respective grades. It has been a challenging season for CW in some areas, yet there is also cause to celebrate. The CW women’s First Div. team has struggled for many seasons, not with numbers but with young players learning the game and a win has been out of reach. This season, some four years of hard labor has produced results, and the women have finished in sixth place out of fourteen teams and find themselves travelling to Bayside for the quarter-final match on Saturday. Led by Ella Gallant and Annabelle LaPointe, they will be good value for a stern test. Our best wishes accompany them.

Their male counterparts also find themselves in quarter-final action when they will play UVic Norsemen at UVic on Saturday, at 12:45. Our chaps dropped a hard-fought, yet decisive win to the students two weeks back, 5 – 20. UVic demonstrated the difference between a team that topped the table and the fourth place finisher. UVic warmed up for this one, notching over a century, when they annihilated Comox last weekend. CW will be a far different challenge for them this weekend. The ‘dogs’ will need to find a way to handle the Norsemen’s pace and deft handling. UVic are liberally sprinkled with CW ‘grads’ and CW has a nice mix of age, experience and toughness, along with youthful impetuosity and exciting expansion of play. Hopefully the Divvies will be well supported. Personally, I cannot get to this one. Go, you good things! Upsets allowed.

The final playoff match for Ceedub will take place a Juan de Fuca, also at 12:45. The women’s Prems will play the hosts. As always this will be a tussle. The results often depend on who Westshore can add to their roster. Both teams this year have defeated teams higher in the standings, with wins over Burnaby and Meralomas. Their intra-club results have both gone in favor of Westshore, 29 – 22, and 37 – 26. The Westshore Faithful will be out in abundance, as their men’s team play UVic in their playoff match, so expect the sidelines to be vocal! I give the home team an edge, but as always, a battle. With CW having men’s and women’s games at the same time, across town, support may be minimal, however, adversity oftimes brings out the best in a good team and it is to be hoped this will be the case on Saturday. Go, you beauties!

FOOTNOTE: Shoutout to Peter "Golden Gate" Kilshaw for a recent "re-union" luncheon. It was a luncheon to re-live the OBW UK TOUR of 1983, especially in honour of the tour organiser, Jim Dempsey, back "home" for a visit from Newfoundland. Many tour tales were relived and released! Seen in passing Ron Crawford, Mike Antolin, Gord Hawkins, Guy Prevost, Tom Sinnott, Patty Stewart, Pat Trelawney, Terry Tabor, Charlie Maclachlin, Frank Carson, Greg Smith, Paul Shepherd, John Morley, et al! Rugby Tours are basically a thing of the past due to excessive costs, limited time availability, personnel unavailability, however, back in the day, they were definitely a "thing"! Good to see all these old blokes in fine fettle.