We talked yesterday about the favorable group the US drew for this weekend’s sevens tournament. Yes Canada is playing great rugby as of late, but Canada-Argentina-Scotland is nothing like the New Zealand-Fiji-France draw that Spain had.

Well consider that another opportunity wasted for the US. The US didn’t play complete games against Canada and Argentina falling behind 19-0 in the first half of their opener vs. Argentina and watching Canada go on a 19-7 run from the end of the first half through the end of the game. Both games saw the US show that they can play with the teams for a while, but the performances were incomplete.

In the first game of the tournament for both teams a sloppy first half that saw the US struggle to maintain possession left them behind Argentina 19-0. Credit to the US, they mounted a furious second half rally featuring a fantastic try by Carlin Isles and a second try by Brett Thompson late on in the half. The US needed to retain possession off of their final kickoff however and weren’t able to and Argentina held on for the 19-12 win. The game did mark the debut of Madison Hughes on the USA Sevens team. More on the junior from Dartmouth later.

Photo Credit: tedkerwin via Compfight cc

The US came out much better  in the second game against Canada and even opened scoring just over a minute in on a Andrew Durutalo try. Canada answered back on a major US mistake but the first half was still competitive, ending with a Canada try after the clock had expired. Canada took control in the second half though with two trys to go up 24-5. Nick Edwards added a try late on for the US but it was too little too late and Canada ended the game with another try with the clock run out to win 29-12.

The US again came out hot against Scotland with both Carlin Isles and Nick Edwards scoring for the US. Madison Hughes made his first start for the US and things were going pretty well until Danny Barrett was sent to the sin bin late in the half. Scotland took advantage with a score to make it 14-5 at the break. Scotland cut the lead to just two early in the half but Hughes got his first ever try for the US half way through to extend the lead for the US back to 19-12. The US only had to play some defense but it didn’t take long for Scotland to answer, just about a minute later Scotland tied things up and neither team could break through at the end with things ending in a 19-19 tie.

The US ended up group play at 0-2-1, the same as Scotland, but they had a point differential of -22 to just -8 for Scotland. That blowout loss to Canada proved very costly. As a result of the last place finish the US faces a bowl quarterfinal against France (ninth in the year-long standings) instead of Spain (15th in the year-long standings and who the US blew out twice in Las Vegas). The US will still be ahead of Spain entering Japan in late March barring a major surprise tonight, but a win against France would probably allow the US to expand the lead by three or more points. The US has looked better on the second day of tournaments several times this year. Hopefully we see that again today before a five week break until Japan.

Schedule:

All times ET
Friday:
Bowl Quarterfinal – USA vs. France – 8:06 PM
With loss to France – Shield Semifinal – USA vs. loser of Kenya-Portugal – 10:32 PM
With win against France – Bowl Semifinal – USA vs. winner of Kenya-Portugal – 11:16 PM

Saturday:
With shield semifinal win – Shield Final – USA vs. TBD – 1:30 AM
With bowl semifinal win – Bowl Final – USA vs. TBD – 2 AM

You should be able to watch online for free at the USA Sevens website. It’s worked last night just fine.