OUA Men's Rugby Roundup (Oct.30)

October 28, 2017

Western 12 Laurier 36

On the strength of a pair of tries from Bastien Demas-Pandraud, the Wilfrid Laurier Golden Hawks men's rugby team won their first playoff game in modern team history on Saturday, defeating the Western Mustangs 36-12.

Having not won a playoff game since 1999, when team records began being tracked online, Laurier came out strong against Western, a team that owned an identical 5-3 record to the purple and gold.

Demas-Pandraud opened the scoring just over five minutes into the game with his first try of the game and that was followed shortly after by a try from Nathan Roberts of Waterloo, Ont.

That scoreline held up until late in the first half when Laurier and Western exchanged tries but a successful conversion from the Hawks left them up 19-5 at the break.

Western looked to begin their comeback early in the second half as Luc Hansen-Boucher of Vancouver, B.C., found the try line and the successful conversion left the Mustangs trailing by just seven.

However, Demas-Pandraud quickly restored a comfortable cushion with his second try of the afternoon and the Hawks sealed the victory with a pair of late tries to advance to the OUA Semifinals for the first time.

Andrew Quattrin of Holland Landing, Ont., Matthew Fish of Waterloo, Ont., and Jackson Smith of Erin, Ont., all finished with single tries on the day while Roberts added three conversions to finish the game with 11 points.

Source: Laurier Golden Hawks

Brock 14 McMaster 68

The offence flowed freely for McMaster Saturday, as the Marauders put a firm stamp on their OUA quarterfinal before advancing to the next stage.

Mac scored a whopping total of 10 tries in a 68-14 drubbing of the Brock Badgers on their last home game day of 2017.

Having secured a spot in the conference semi-finals, the Marauders will now hit the road to rematch the Guelph Gryphons on Friday, who out-duelled them in a tightly-contested 21-15 game in the regular season.

In addition to a pair of penalty tries, the duo of Mitch Richardson and Jamie McNaughton each had a pair, while Liam Pendakis, Jack McRogers, Max Pinkerton and Will Kelly added one each.

Kelly added seven converts for a total of 19 points.

McMaster will look to avenge their loss at the semi-final stage in Guelph a season ago, after which they recovered to win OUA bronze.

Source: McMaster Marauders