2021 School rugby
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@taniwharugby Rotorua BHS lost to Hamilton BHS in the Super 8 final last year, and they (RBHS) are perennial semi-finalists in that competition. The Super 8 would be the second strongest 1st XV competition behind the Auckland 1A. A quick look at the results of Whangarei BHS so far shows they lost 17-7 to MAGS, who I watched play last Sat, so this could be a close game.
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@bovidae said in 2021 School rugby:
@taniwharugby Rotorua BHS lost to Hamilton BHS in the Super 8 final last year, and they (RBHS) are perennial semi-finalists in that competition. The Super 8 would be the second strongest 1st XV competition behind the Auckland 1A. A quick look at the results of Whangarei BHS so far shows they lost 17-7 to MAGS, who I watched play last Sat, so this could be a close game.
Second strongest comp? What do you base that assertion on?
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@shark said in 2021 School rugby:
Second strongest comp? What do you base that assertion on?
The National Top 4 results. There have been multiple winners from both the 1A and Super 8 over the last decade. A South Island team hasn't even made the final since OBHS in 2012. Scots the only team from the Wellington region over the same period.
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@bovidae said in 2021 School rugby:
@shark said in 2021 School rugby:
Second strongest comp? What do you base that assertion on?
The National Top 4 results. There have been multiple winners from both the 1A and Super 8 over the last decade. A South Island team hasn't even made the final since OBHS in 2012. Scots the only team from the Wellington region over the same period.
First strongest I think was what @shark had to be meaning, half the winners of the last 20 years have been Super 8.
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If we look at the results from 2010 to present, the following teams have been winners or finalists:
Auckland 1A - MAGS, Kelston, St Kents, St Peter's, King's
Super 8 - Hamilton BHS, Rotorua BHS, Hastings BHS, Napier BHS
CNI - Wesley
Wellington - Scots
South Island - Otago BHS -
@bovidae said in 2021 School rugby:
If we look at the results from 2010 to present, the following teams have been winners or finalists:
Auckland 1A - MAGS, Kelston, St Kents, St Peter's, King's
Super 8 - Hamilton BHS, Rotorua BHS, Hastings BHS, Napier BHS
CNI - Wesley
Wellington - Scots
South Island - Otago BHSSince 2010 the 1A has 5 wins and 2 finalists, the Super 8 has 5 wins and 4 finalists.
Since 2000 the 1A has 6 wins and 6 finalists, the Super 8 has 10 wins and 7 finalists. -
@bovidae RBHS up 31-0 at the break....
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@taniwharugby Final score was 43-0.
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43-0 at FT.
RBHS score about what I expected but thought WBHS would get a couple of tries.
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Can't argue with the results. But I can point out an imbalance which helps the Super 8's strength comparative to the SI and Wellington.
The Super 8 brings together teams from eight major centres in Hamilton, Tauranga, Rotorua, Napier, Hastings, Gisborne, Palmerston North and New Plymouth. Most of these cities have a dominant school and most of the local talent is likely sucked into a small pool of schools in those NI areas. Success breeding success. Comparatively, the Upper SI comp has 7 greater Christchurch schools and of the other areas represented only Nelson comes close to comparing in population to those towns. In terms of structure, many of those NI schools' competitive advantage compares most closely to Dunedin with one clearly dominant school, one traditional but consistently lesser rival in Kings HS and not much else from McGlashan and Cavanagh. So it's little surprise that OBHS are the only SI school to have made a national final in a long time.
Sure, CBHS has been pretty dominant locally, has much larger roll than any other traditional Christchurch rugby school and has produced a vast number of All Blacks, but the talent is also spread amongst St Bedes, St Andrews and Christ's predominantly, plus St Thomas's and Shirley. Rangiora has also emerged in recent years. So the playing pool is spread largely among those 7 schools in a region counting approx 400,000. Compare that to playing talent being funneled into a dominant school in a city of say 70,000, and multiply that and put them in a competition together and it's little wonder the Super 8 does well. If the majority of the talent in Canterbury was funneled into 5 schools rather than 7 you'd no doubt see a different standard.
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@shark Except, that in towns like Napier and Hastings the majority of talent is not funneled into the 2 dominant schools (Napier & Hastings Boys). We also have schools in the next tier (CNI) in Lindisfarne and St John's. These schools won't make the Top 4, but still attract local talent and have produced All Blacks & Super Rugby players. To use a rough calculation similar to yours: a combined Napier & Hastings population of approx. 115,000 is spread among 4 schools.
The same applies to schools in Hamilton, Palmerston North (Feilding HS, for example) and New Plymouth (Francis Douglas MC). I don't know about Gisborne, Tauranga and Rotorua.
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@shark said in 2021 School rugby:
So it's little surprise that OBHS are the only SI school to have made a national final in a long time.
It's actually been a while since the SI school won a game at the Top 4 (including the 3rd/4th game). Nelson didn't in 2019, nor Christchurch BHS the year before.
In the Waikato there are 3 strong rugby schools. St Paul's Collegiate (the equivalent of your Christ's) has dominated the CNI competition. St Peter's Cambridge won consecutive Top 4 co-ed titles a few years back. St John's have also had their strong seasons.
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@taniwharugby Yes, Tim Seifert went there.
They are involved in all sports and have attracted a lot of top quality coaches ($$$). Ricki Herbert was there a while back to run their football programme.
Very strong in basketball, golf, cycling (next to the Avantidrome), rowing and equestrian.
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@shark Considering the discussion was about what was the "second" strongest school's competition, it's not that relevant to discuss how good a competition would be if other factors existed. Yep, you could apply little tweaks to the Canterbury competition to make the schools stronger, but as @stargazer notes you can do the same in Hawkes Bay as well. At any rate, Chch had a pretty good run in the mid 2000s winning three top 4s in a row.
You blokes dominate at NPC level and franchise level, I'm sure you can handle not being dominant at schools level.
@Stargazer There's also Te Aute as well that would pick up the odd few players that might be useful to Hastings.
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@bovidae said in 2021 School rugby:
@shark said in 2021 School rugby:
So it's little surprise that OBHS are the only SI school to have made a national final in a long time.
It's actually been a while since the SI school won a game at the Top 4 (including the 3rd/4th game). Nelson didn't in 2019, nor Christchurch BHS the year before.
In the Waikato there are 3 strong rugby schools. St Paul's Collegiate (the equivalent of your Christ's) has dominated the CNI competition. St Peter's Cambridge won consecutive Top 4 co-ed titles a few years back. St John's have also had their strong seasons.
Do those teams play Hamilton Boys first XV these days?
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@nepia Usually. Ham BHS played St Paul's 2 weeks ago. Often they play them as pre-season games before the Super 8 starts. In the past they have also played to find the Waikato school that goes forward to be involved in the Chiefs playoffs for the Top 4.
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@nepia Yeah, I thought about Te Aute, but didn't mention it because they aren't competing in CNI anymore and are now more similar (in strength) to the other schools that compete in the Hawke's Bay school competition (like Wairoa College, Central HB College, Taradale HS etc). Tbh, they've been pretty bad in recent years. I think Te Aute attracts students for reasons not related to rugby, and not just from the province, but from all over the country (like in the past, Karl Te Nana, Piri Weepu, Kane Hames etc).
