High School – Opening Day
Denver East High Angels v Boulder
Clear skies, warming on the Saturday, and a bit of a breeze for kickoff of the East-Boulder match played on the turf at South High School, Denver, due construction at East home pitch on the Esplanade at City Park The Angels were one of last season’s finalists, while Boulder looked to improve on their 2023 finish.
East grabbed an early lead on a grounding by outside center, Cole Conforti, completed by fullback, Eli Zsemlye, and 7-nil in the 5th minute. It was a scoreless battle for the next 20 minutes with Boulder ceding possession on handling errors and Angels capitalizing on those mistakes to keep play in the Boulder half.
Home side increased their margin in the 25th when Boulder infringed as East looked to score certainly, so a penalty try was awarded by field magistrate Chris Brewer, and 14-0 just then. Angels got a third before the half. With visitors on attack outside the Denver 22, an overthrown Boulder lineout was gathered by flyhalf, Alex Dempsey, who stepped inside a tackle, shrugged off another, and sped 70 meters to touch down for tallies of 19 and 0 in favor of East at Brewer’s halftime signal. The Angels were better at breakdown, coming in numbers to effect turnover, while Boulder experienced difficulty maintaining forward momentum.
East halfback, Zachary Fields, collecting tapped lineout as Denver pressures the Boulder line - image: h. Richard Boulder 8, Nicolas Kemp, picks-and-goes, looking to dent the East defense
Five minutes into second stanza, ball swung wide to openside flanker, Julian Rowse, saw him make his own road to goal and grounding for the bonus-point score: East 24, Boulder 0. East would score another try through scrumhalf Fields, converted by Zsemiye, for the record: East 31 - 0 Boulder
Scoring:
Denver East – Try: Conforti, PT, Dempsey, Rowse, Fields; Con: Zsemiye (3);
Referee: C. Brewer
East headed short side off the won scrum