It was a 1275-point season for Westlake Boys' High, one of the biggest ever.
By Adam Julian & Bruce Holloway
There was mixed feedback to last week’s review of the Auckland first XV 1A media ban.
Gil Laurenson, former principal of Otahuhu College, recalled how having a televised game against De La Salle College some years back had been such a wonderful boost for school morale.
“There were no negatives that I was aware of at the time but for one player in particular – Roger Tuivasa Sheck – it was an opportunity to showcase his skills to the nation,” Laurenson said.
Laurenson, who believed he was the only principal of recent times who has ever coached a 1A team, said the media ban was “railroaded through” and was “more about the paternalistic attitude of some principals”.
Meanwhile former Massey Rugby Club chairman and life member Peter Hogg – who had advocated for years to have schoolboy rugby taken off Sky TV – said Auckland’s 1A competition was “the worst thing that is happening in rugby today”.
“I have witnessed up close how first XV can ruin a young player,” Hogg said. “In most of these so-called rugby schools, the minute a kid shows some talent he is in the fast track to the top side.
“So we have an academy and bugger-the-rest type of system. I have seen it time and time again. Players develop at different stages of their lives and Auckland 1A is missing out on the Conrad and Ben Smiths of this world.
“They are cast aside as too small even though they have the skills because 1A is all about smashing the opposition into the ground.”
Hogg said the drop-out rate from secondary school rugby to club rugby was alarming and he felt clubs needed to hang on to players until they were 15, before handing them over to schools.
“Rugby clubs are dying – and I am not saying it’s all the fault of schools and the hype that surrounds first XV rugby, as there are other issues at play – but I, and many others, think it is a massive factor.
“A lot of boys that don’t make first 15 drift away because the whole focus is on the top team in the school. Playing for the second 15 is not cool.
“Don’t get me wrong, I am no friend of some of these principals. A lot of them are so focused on winning 1A they forget about the big picture. They have no interest in what happens to players after high school.
“Why should they? It’s all about next year’s first XV.”
Hogg said a lot of “so-called first XV stars” were not interested in playing for a club – or if they did it was a form of lip service – while he argued even schools like Westlake did “not exactly represent the local community”.
“It annoys me that so much is made of first XV rugby. I think I recall you called it grassroots rugby. Nowhere near it. Club rugby is grassroots rugby.”
New Zealand Schools and New Zealand Māori U18 rugby teams recorded comprehensive weekend wins.
A well-drilled and vibrant New Zealand Māori U18 team dispatched an underwhelming Northland U19 team 62-0 in Hamilton, while New Zealand Schools ran up a record 57-22 victory over New Zealand Barbarians.
New Zealand Schools took their playing record to 136 wins in 154 matches with their biggest win over the New Zealand Barbarians in a rivalry that began in 2015.
Behind an athletic and efficient forward pack, Rico Simpson ran rampant, even holding the ball in the air with one hand Nikola Jokic style on occasion. The Sacred Heart first five-eighths showed a full array of skills as the Barbarian defence leaked like a sieve succumbing to Simpson’s flair and guile.
The Barbarian start was encouraging enough, trailing 17-12 after 20 minutes. Centre Cooper Roberts was their most incisive and helped set up both wings.
However, New Zealand’s fifth try – created when Simpson craftily deflected the ball to Oli Mathis and the Hamilton Boys’ openside stormed 60m down the sideline, bamboozling the fullback on his way to the chalk – is hopefully prophetic. In the immediate future, Mathis is bound for the Crusaders and it’s not hard to see why.
Sacred Heart lock Josh Tengbald also scored a try from past halfway with a startling turn of pace.
Mosese Bason, out of Feilding High School, has a brother and sister playing for Manawatū. The No 8 appears to have the credentials to join his siblings quickly on his display.
Rugged hooker Shaun Kempton is a success story out of Selwyn Combined while both halfbacks, Dylan Pledger (King’s High School, Dunedin) and Charlie Sinton (Tauranga Boys’ College), cleared promptly and weren’t afraid to snipe around the rucks. Pledger scored the first try of the match with a 40m burst.
Meanwhile players like Hone Mathieson justify the reason for the Māori team. The head prefect of Te Kuiti High School (Sir Colin Meads alma mater) replaced Westlake Boys’ first five-eighths Blake Lidgard at halftime and showed he belonged with the big boys with an assured and clinical display. These days lads from Te Kuiti struggle to get a look in, but the iwi selection process is robust and often unearths gems.
Hamilton Boys’ High School wing Kurtis Hana was in damaging form with three tries, Will Cole, typically a No 10 at Rathkeale College, shone at fullback and hooker Hoani Nikora-Wilson showed the mongrel that helped Southland Boys’ win the National Top Four.
Māori U18 played their first official fixture in 2016 when they beat an even weaker Bay of Plenty opposition 103-0, while in 2018 they memorably upset the New Zealand Barbarians 21-20, performing a stirring waiata in the middle of Jerry Collins Stadium afterwards.
Last year, they gave New Zealand Schools a scare and were only foiled 24-27, in acolossal struggle that would have sent shudders up top.
New Zealand Schools: 57 (Oli Mathis 2, Mosese Bason 2, Dylan Pledger, Josh Tengbald, Tayne Harvey, Shaun Kempton tries; Rico Simpson 7 con, pen) New Zealand Barbarian Schools: 22 (Kyan Rangitutia 2, Nathan Salmon tries; Hugh Robinson con) HT: 36-12
New Zealand Māori Ngā Mareikura U18: 62 (Kurtis Hana 3, Will Cole 2, Hiraka Waitai-Haenga 2, Hoani Nikora-Wilson, Hone Mathieson, Jimmy Pender tries; Blake Lidgard 2 con, Mathieson 4 con) Northland U19: 0 HT: 24-0
Upcoming fixtures:
Thursday (September 28) noon: NZ Barbarian U18 v NZ Māori U18 (St Paul’s Collegiate, Hamilton)
4pm (NZ time): Australia U18 v NZ Schools (Viking Park, Canberra).
Monday (October 2), 1pm NZ time: Australia U18 v NZ Schools (Viking Park, Canberra)
Blues region champions Westlake Boys’ High School scored a staggering 1225 points in 24 games (21 wins) this season, and excluding pre-season fixtures, fullback Isaac Murray-McGregor scored 257 points by himself.
Westlake extended their unbeaten run in the North Harbour Championship, which they’ve won 20 times since 1985, to 29 consecutive matches, and briefly held the Moascar Cup for the first time since 1989, but fell just short in the national final against Southland.
It’s a reminder that only four schools have ever scored 1000 points in a season and won or shared the National Top Four. They are:
1994: Gisborne Boys’ High School, 25 wins, 0 defeats, 1148 points.
1997: Wesley College, 26 wins, 6 defeats, 1014 points.
2001: Wesley College, 19 wins, 0 defeats, 1045 points.
2002: Napier Boys’ High School, 22 wins, 1 draw, 1 defeat, 1088 points.
2004: Wesley College, 23 wins, 1 draw, 1 defeat, 1317 points.
2017: Hastings Boys’ High School, 20 wins, 1 draw, 1,035 points.
Here are some other notable seasonal or historic efforts from the past:
# Otago Boys’ High School won 24 games on the trot and scored 1348 points en route to the 2012 National final, which they lost to St Kentigern College (31-7).
# Feilding High School, featuring All Black Codie Taylor, scored 1022 points in 26 games (24 wins) on their way to winning the now defunct National Co-Ed competition in 2009.
# It’s likely the record for most points in a season is held by Kelston Boys’ High School who amassed 1415 in 1998. They won 30 out of 31 games failing to Otago Boys’ High School in the National Top Four semifinal.
St Kentigern College scored 1762 points in their unbeaten run of 52 games between 2012 and 2013.
# St Stephen’s were 23-0 in 1975 and scored 1141 points. Their 1977 team toured the UK and were even more successful with 33 wins on the trot, scoring 1270 points and conceding just 102.
# Te Aute College won 114 of 129 games between 1979 and 1984, including the National Top Four in 1984. In 46 of those games, they scored more than 40 points.The coach was Awi Riddell.
# Graham Henry had Auckland Grammar School from 1975 to 1980 won five 1A Auckland titles in six years and 92 of 101 games. His teams scored a little over 2000 points so they weren’t huge scorers, but in a tough competition.
# The 1920 Christchurch Boys’ High School First XV was the first team to win the Moascar Cup, against Palmerston North BHS 1-0 at Athletic Park, Wellington. They won all 14 games and outscored opponents 584-20 dotting down for 142 three-point tries. Their average winning score was 42-1 and they beat St Bede’s College 88-0 (128-0 in modern scoring). Geoff Alley, James Burrows, Sydney Carlton, Frank Clark, and Curly Page became All Blacks. Between 2004 and 2006 Christchurch Boys’ High School was unbeaten in 60 consecutive matches winning the National Top Four three times. The most points they scored in a season was 934 in 2005.
# In girls rugby, Feilding High School won all 51 matches of sevens, tens, and fifteens in 2012 and scored 2,380 points. Amy Cockayne who scored a hat-trick in the World Cup final for England against the Black Ferns was in the team. In the next two years, Hamilton Girls’ High School won 92 out of 94 matches in similar circumstances and scored 4292 points. Black Ferns captain Kennedy Simon was involved.
It’s possible Nigel Hotham and Greg Kirkham have won more games at one school than any coaches in New Zealand first XV history.
The pair have coached Hamilton Boys’ High School from 2003 to 2023 in 404 matches and won 345. During that time Hamilton have scored 13,390 points and conceded 4242 for an average score of 33-11.
Hamilton have also won a record five National Top Four, 15 Super 8, and four Sanix World Youth titles.
And in the past two decades, Hamilton have had more defences of the Moascar Cup (33 in four tenures) than any other school and produced 51 New Zealand Secondary School players.
All Blacks in this period have been Quinn Tupaea, Emoni Narawa, Josh Lord, Sevu Reece, and Tawera Kerr-Barlow. Hamilton has also won the Condor Sevens a record nine times.
Prior to Hamilton, Hotham had a successful period at Kelston Boys’ High School that included winning the Moascar Cup in 2002.
Elsewhere, Evan Lewis won 342 out of 378 matches as coach at St Stephen’s School in a span from 1954 to 1971. St Stephens enjoyed seven unbeaten seasons and scored 9151 points, conceding 1981. Lewis also guided four unbeaten teams at Thames High School. In 1950 Thames was 22-0 and beat 1A champions Auckland Grammar School.
But Ian Colquhoun at Palmerston North Boys’ High School would have given Lewis, Hotham, and Kirkham a nudge. He won 169 out of 232 inter-school games alone between 1955 and 1983. Palmerston North was a perennial powerhouse. The 1966 First XV was 24-0, featuring All Black Bob Burgess, while the 1982 team won 29 out of 31 games.
Chris Grinter coached Rotorua Boys’ High School from 1993 to 2003 and again in 2006. His teams won 237 out of 280 games and scored exactly 10,000 points with a record of 1213 in 2000. Grinter also guided Wesley College to 99 wins in 133 games between 1986 and 1991, and Ngaruawahia College to 98 wins in 168 games (1977-1984). A winner of four National Top Four titles (1990, 1993, 1998, 2002), Grinter had 49 wins in 54 matches as coach of Northern Regions, Waikato, and New Zealand Schools too.
Future All Blacks coach JJ Stewart was First XV head at New Plymouth Boys’ High School from 1950 to 1964. He fashioned an enviable record. From 1956-1959 alone New Plymouth Boys’ High School were unbeaten in 55 consecutive games, winning by an average score of 25-5 in the era of three-point tries.
Other coaches (not an exclusive list) that would have won 200 games include Kim Harris (Gisborne BHS, 261), Jim Wallace (Whanganui Collegiate, 231), Dick Gordon (Western Heights High School, 210), Dick Glover (Gisborne BHS & Auckland GS, 205), Awi Riddell (St Stephen’s School/Te Aute College) and Gerry Davidson (Timaru BHS/St Bede’s College).
Feedback to nzschoolboyrugby@gmail.com
Scott Robertson has resisted any temptation to rotate his side for the All Blacks’ year-ending test against Italy, naming as strong a side as possible for Sunday’s clash.