Any player hoping to make the Junior All-Americans squad for next month's Junior World Rugby Trophy are going to have to impress this weekend as the team assembles in Seattle for one final camp. Head coach Billy Millard and his staff have named 26 players to the camp, including just three from last year's Junior World Championship team—Zac Bonte, Vili Toluta'u, and Jospehy Whalen. Due to school and other commitments not every player in consideration is at the camp. The Junior All-Americans previously had camps in Arizona and California.
As part of the camp the team will scrimmage Seattle-OPSB on Sunday. Seattle-OPSB has several capped players on their squad but it is expected that they will field a mixed squad for the match as to give the Junior All-Americans a more level playing field.
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Some of the players to keep an eye on during the camp include Ben Cima, Hanco Germishuys, Ben Penkelman, and Valdermar Lee-Lo. All of those players have had success at the High School All-American level. Valdermar teamed up with Titi Lamositele during the HSAA's tour of Argentina last year.
The JWRT kicks off on April 7th in Hong Kong. The U.S. is in a pool with Georgia, Hong Kong, and Tonga.
Since we're in Seattle we'll try to get you some photos and reaction from camp.
Squad: Alex Augsburg, Niall Barry, Zac Bonte, Ben Cima, Scott Dean, Oliver Drew, Tyler Enfield, Gabe Farley, James Gannon, Hanco Germishuys, Connor Gleason, Myles Godfrey, Seth Halliman, Codi Jones, Joe Kelly, Valdermar Lee-Lo, Malcolm, Ben Pinkleman, Nemia Qoro, Lindsay Stevens, Eric Thompson, Vili Toluta'u, James Vaifale, Conor Wallace-Sims, Christian Weisling, Joseph Whalen