Black and Blue products help U19 Selects win rugby tourney
Daily Inter Lake | Daily Inter-Lake | UPDATED 1 week, 2 days AGO
Montana Select U19 players, from left, Kaya Carlburg, Gabby Richer, Natalie Bertram and Ciara Shade pose with the champions banner from the Great Northwest Challenge rugby tournament on Sunday. (photo courtesy of Tim Carlburg)
The Montana Selects, fortified by four young women from the local Black and Blue Rugby Club, won the Great Northwest Challenge tournament that took place over the weekend in Bozeman.
Glacier High product Natalie Bertram, Columbia Falls’ Kaya Carlburg and home-schooled players Ciara Shade and Gabby Richer were plucked off the Flathead Valley Black and Blue for the U19 Selects.
It was the third time on the Selects for Bertram, a utility player who also had two seasons playing on the U16 Selects.
Carlburg has been playing rugby for four years, including one year spent in New Zealand, and was a starting flyhalf on this, her third year as a Select.
Shade made the U19 for a second time and played well enough – long runs, key passes and critical tackles – to earn an invitational to the USA Rugby U19 Eagles talent identification camp later this summer. Carlburg had been to the Eagles camp previously.
Richer made the team despite this being her first year playing rugby.
The quartet joined 21 of the top players in Montana, as chosen by a committee of three coaches.
The team went 3-1 in Bozeman, starting with a 29-5 loss to Idaho TOA High Performance and ended with a 22-5 victory over the same Idaho squad.
In between the Montana Selects trounced the NorCal Grizzlies 53-0 and handled a bigger, physical Arizona Bobcats side 33-12.
That set the stage for the rematch, in which Montana shut out Idaho in the second half.
The Flathead Valley Black and Blue offers teams from U12 to U19 and is open to all players, girls and boys. More information can be found at www.flatheadyouthrugby.org.