MASON CITY – Nineteen players from Mason City’s River City Rugby Football Club traveled to Iowa Falls today to compete in an Iowa Dlll Rugby League match. The squad from River City started the competition off with the first score of the match. Blake Spotts, a second generation River City player who was playing in his first match ever expertly completed two grub kicks advancing the ball into the Try Zone where he obtained possession and scored the try for River City. The home team from Iowa Falls the utilized a very quick forward pack inserting into the back line to notch four scores before the half, making it a 20-5 lead after the first 40 minutes of play.
River City made some adjustments at the half and battled in for another try by Phill Rice to make the score 20-10. The home team crossed the Try Line twice more in the 2nd forty minutes of play and made one conversion kick to take the victory with a final score of 32-10.
A sizable group of fans made the hour trip South to support the River City team and cheered the team on for 80 minutes of hard fought play. River City will head to Dubuque next Saturday for their 2nd straight road match of the Fall season, followed by a home match vs the Iowa City Ducks on Sept. 22nd.
This season marks the 40th straight season of Rugby for the Club, which celebrated it’s 40th Anniversary this past June. River City was the 6th Rugby Club formed in the State of Iowa, which now has over 30 adult clubs of men’s and women’s teams, and over 20 High School 7s teams. The sport of Rugby in the United States has seen a substantial growth in the last couple of years partially due to the sport being played again in the Olympics in 2016.
River City Rugby practices and plays their home matches at Hoover Elementary School grounds. Practices are held on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 5:30 p.m. The Fall League matches are played on Saturdays at 1:30 p.m.
Watch short video:
httpv://youtu.be/_dOmHkdZ0ik
