Stones is rolling to a Canadian U-20 win

Cam Stones will captain the U-20 team in the Junior World Rugby Championship, joined by Andrew Ferguson (centre).

The McMaster Men’s rugby team has been among the more successful varsity sports on campus in recent years, winning six OUA championships in the last decade alone. Along with these championships have come numerous opportunities for our Marauders to make their mark on provincial, even national stages, and it seems that 2012 is shaping up to be yet another hallmark year.

In a recent tour of South America the Ontario Senior Men’s Team (“The Blues”) fielded five current and former marauders for their three-game series against national teams from Chile, Uruguay and an Argentinean Club side Salta.Under the guidance of team captain Mike Pletch (a former Marauder captain) who had help from fellow alumni of the Maroon and Grey Daniel West and Michael Scholz, The Blues, who also dressed current Mac stars Tyler Ardron (Current McMaster Captain) and Cam Stones, came away with a 2-1 record for the tour.

Stones, who has recently been appointed captain of Canada’s U-20 side, will take this experience forward as he looks to lead his team into the Junior World Rugby Trophy Championships in Utah which will take place in Salt Lake City, from June 18-30.

Stones will be joined south of the border by Marauder teammate Andrew Ferguson, who played with Stones on Canada’s U-20 side last year. Ferguson will also be found representing Canada at the World University Championships in Brive, France from July 11-13. This month, Canada’s Senior Men’s National Team will be hosting three international tests.

The matches will see the team face the United States in Kingston on June 9, Italy at BMO Field in Toronto on June 15 and Georgia in Burnaby, BC, on June 23.

On June 1, Marauder alumni Aaron Carpenter was named Canada’s captain for the three tests and will be joined by Mike Scholz and Tyler Ardron – who will be looking for his first cap on the Senior Men’s team.

Both Scholz and Ardron are regular members of Canada’s Nation 7’s team and are recent gold medal winners at last year’s PanAm Games.
Adding to the success of Marauder players, Shaun Allen, former Head Coach of the Marauders and OUA Men’s Rugby coach of the year in 2010, was selected as the new Head Coach of Rugby Ontario in April.

Allen has been a key player in three OUA championships during his four-year playing career at McMaster before joining the Marauder coaching staff – a position he took on an interim basis while head coach Phil White was on sabbatical. Allen will also be joining Stones and Ferguson this June as an Assistant Coach for Canada’s U-20 team.

• Jason Erlich and Tyler Wright