The Queen’s Men’s Rugby team tied their highest place finish at the Canadian University Men’s Rugby Championship this year, defeating the provincial champions the Guelph Gryphons 38-28, and the dominant Victoria Vikes 26-24 on their way to National silver.
Head Coach of the Men’s Rugby team, John Lavery, sat down with The Journal to speak about what the win meant for him as his first year leading the Gaels, and for the players.
“It’s been an ambition of mine personally to medal at that level. I was at the first four of them [championships] with Concordia, but we never quite got there. We got to a whole bunch of bronze medal games but just fell short. Getting that victory over Guelph in the semis was pretty massive, […] it was a pretty special moment,” Coach Lavery said. “I think it’s genuinely a satisfaction with the way the group came together.”
The Gaels, both figuratively and literally, slayed the dragon, defeating the Gryphons for the first time since 2022, and the circumstances couldn’t have been any more dire.
Coach Lavery gave insight on what clicked for the Gaels going into the semi-final game against their divisional rivals.
“Looking back at the two losses, we did a lot of good things, but made enough errors in of our decision making and defence, taking penalties at really critical moments,” Lavery said. “We were very disciplined, and that allowed us to play a more positive brand of rugby globally. Win, lose, or draw, we were going to enjoy doing that no matter what.”
Coach Lavery touched on the perceived invincibility of the Gryphons, emphasizing that recognizing Guelph’s humanity—that they, too, are fallible—allowed the team to sharpen their focus on scoring tries and strengthening their defence.
“I think minimizing how high of a pedestal we put them on was also a big part of that. They’re just a rugby team, like any other.” Later adding, “on any given day, anybody really can beat anybody.”
One of the most advantageous aspects of the Gaels participation in the National championships, Lavery disclosed, was the outreach from the Queen’s community, helping to inspire and encourage the Men’s team in their campaign for National Gold.
“The travelling parents was unreal. There are so many of them, and in that quick turnaround from a really disappointing final result, into a tough game against Victoria, the micro kindnesses, micro affections, rather than the microaggressions which are such a prominent thing out there in the world, what they did was bring a ton of care to the guys. That was pretty special; I’ve definitely never had engagement or involvement on that level before,” Lavery said.
The Gaels will be given a couple of weeks off to recover both mentally and physically before Coach Lavery gets them back in the gym and preparing for next season. Until then, he hopes that they’ll take in their monumental accomplishment.
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