Lakefront 7's Recap

The first girls high school match of the day featured Wisconsin Division Two 7's State Champs, the Appleton Dragons against the Division 1 State Champs in Catholic Memorial. Memorial, playing without several noteable seniors, nonetheless had a lot of experience out there. A nice break from Dragon's senior standout and WI HS Selects player, Aleah Loll, got them on the board early, but Memorial's experience led to them controlling possession.

Prior to kickoff, Atlanta rugby legend and USA women's Eagle Pat Neder took time out of her playing schedule for a short talk and picture with Memorial about her experiences. Neder is a Catholic Memorial High School alumn, who played in the Olympics in team hand ball and played rugby for the Women's 7's and 15's national team on several occassions. Neder was just inducted into the CMHS Hall of Fame this summer.

Appleton was able to play an excellent game against Penn HS in their second match.  they came back and tied the Indiana team 22 to 22,  Jackie Helmied, Brianna Olson, and Brianna Reehl from Fondy played well.

 Memorial played Penn HS out of Indiana. Memorial's Senior flyhalf, Molly Langhenry, headed to play at UN-Iowa in the fall, sparked a comeback as Penn High School out of Indiana scored first in the most competitive and best-played match of the day. Penn played CMH in the LF 7's final last year, so this was a highly anticipated match. Penn Coach Adrian Sharkey had them dominating possession early and playing some strong, organized defense. They came out hard and scored about a minute in. Then, the match fell into a pattern. After three or four phases of sustained Penn attack, Memorial's defense held, got the turnovoner, and moved the ball and scored. Langhenry scored two tries in this fashion

. Sophomore forward Meaghan Schmitt caused problems for Penn's lineouts with her height, and she scored the final try of the match, after a turnover, as she broke one tackle, stiff armed another, and barreled into the tryzone to finish the match.

 Our third highlighted match of the day featured Muskego, playing with some Oak Creek and Brookfield girls as well. The story of the game was the try-scoring display by junior Reina Anderson, from Wauwatosa East High Schol and Brookfield Rugby. A track standout, she raced her way to four tries. With their third consecutive LF 7's title already wrapped up, Memorial's developmental side gained more valuable experience and they staged a nice comeback in the second half, scoring a long try and critical conversion to tie the match at the final whistle. Appleton would also lose to the dangerous Muskego team. While Penn went on to defeat Muskego. CMHS 22 Appleton 5 CMHS 25 Penn HS 5 Penn HS over Muskego Plus CMHS 22 Muskego Plus 22