Fear Cruises to First Place at Fort Bragg Airborne Sevens

Fear Cruises to First Place at Fort Bragg Airborne Sevens

5/17/08

Cape Fear made the trip up to Fayetteville on Saturday for the first sevens tournament of the season. Due to two last minute no shows, Fear traveled with only eight players; Jason Grunner, Drew Gonzales, Phil Pitstick, Pat Kurent, Frank James, Simba Glass, Elton, and Donald.

Despite having only one sub, Fear played solid rugby all day long and took home the championship somewhat easily.The first match of the day would be the toughest as Fort Bragg found it necessary to put the tournaments two best teams against each other immediately, pitting Fear against Raleigh. Though Raleigh was a technically sound side, Fear had the better athletes and were also able to control possession of the ball throughout most of the game. Fear won the match 21-10 with two tries coming from Drew Gonzales and the other added by Jason Grunner. This would be the closest game of the day.Next up in pool play was a UNC side that had some old boys and some active players. Though Fear got off to a sluggish start, UNC was overmatched and Fear was able to blow them away in the second half. Camp Lejeune was the final pool play opponent and Fear put up a 50-point victory highlighted by Jason Grunner’s between the leg bounce pass and aftermath. The victory put Fear to 3 and 0 for the day and put them in first place in their pool.

Fear faced Columbia in the semifinal match and felt that they owed them for losing twice to them this past spring. Fear got off to a slow start, which was made worse by an injury to Phil Pitstick, who ended up fracturing his arm. Despite the injury and the tough start, Fear was able to regain control of the game and win 28-7 to advance to the championship. In the championship game, Fear was matched up against the Hogs, a combined side consisting of some speedy high schoolers and some Charlotte players. Fear got off to a poor start in this game, giving up two quick tries to find themselves down 12-0. However, Fear did not panic and went about playing their game and were able to score two tries just before halftime to take the lead 14-12. In the second half, Fear picked up right where they left off and proceeded to blow out the shell-shocked Charlotte side. The final score ended at 40-12, making Fear the tournament champions. This was an impressive day for Cape Fear in which everyone who made the trip played well. Fear had seven solid players on the field at all times, despite having only one sub. Simba Glass led Fear with 9 tries, followed by Drew Gonzales and Jason Grunner with 6 each, Donald, Elton, and Frank James each added 3, and Phil scored 2 before his injury. Fear will travel to Charleston next weekend in an attempt to bring home some more hardware.