{"id":36393,"date":"2025-06-05T16:21:58","date_gmt":"2025-06-05T20:21:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=36393"},"modified":"2025-06-05T16:22:00","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T20:22:00","slug":"nearly-700-youth-rugby-players-compete-in-aurora-barbarians-annual-mini-youth-festival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/nearly-700-youth-rugby-players-compete-in-aurora-barbarians-annual-mini-youth-festival\/","title":{"rendered":"Nearly 700 youth rugby players compete in Aurora Barbarians\u2019 annual Mini Youth Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

670 rugby players braved windy and cool conditions at Sheppard\u2019s Bush and St. Maximilian Kolbe CHS to compete ardently in the Aurora Barbarians\u2019 annual Mini Youth Festival on Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The 57-team Festival featured squads from across the GTA including the Caledon Cavaliers, Markham Irish, Barrie RC, Toronto Nomads, Oshawa Vikings, Ajax Wanderers, Burlington Centaurs, Toronto City RC, and the host Barbarians which fielded nine teams in the two-site tournament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the aroma of Harvey\u2019s grilled burgers wafting through the Barbarians\u2019 tent, club president Steve Hall said he was pleased by the level of participation in this year\u2019s tournament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got almost 700 players out here today\u2014U6-U12 teams are here at Sheppard\u2019s Bush and a U14 tournament is being run at St. Max.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hall explained the purposes of the annual tournament, which started as a modest event, but has expanded into one of the top youth festivals endorsed by Rugby Ontario.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s about giving back\u2014passing on a love of the game from the older generation to kids. It\u2019s also about fresh air, friendships, and teamwork. Rugby is a game for life. I\u2019ve been playing it for 45 years and still have the friends I made through the sport.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The engaging Barbs\u2019 leader noted the positive impact of his organization\u2019s tournament on the Town of Aurora: \u201cIt\u2019s a great experience connected to sports tourism and it\u2019s connected today to the Street Festival on Yonge. Our Festival brings people from across York, Durham, Halton, Simcoe, and Peel Regions into Aurora. In the future, it would be great to bring the events together a bit more through coupon books and discount incentives. But most importantly, it\u2019s great to see the kids being active, having fun, and playing a sport outdoors.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ward 1 Councillor Ron Weese\u2014long-time supporter of the Barbs in his role as President of Sport Aurora\u2014praised the local rugby club\u2019s ability to grow their annual tourney.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI wanted to offer my congratulations to the Barbarians for growing the sport in our community and for the success of the Festival. This has become one of the premier rugby festivals in the province for six-to-ten-year-old boys and girls. It\u2019s unique. The tournament brings in 600-700 families into our community and the Barbs have been exemplary for developing players from the Playground to the Podium.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hall\u2014having seen Barbs\u2019 star Chloe Daniels ascend to the podium as a Team Canada silver medalist at the 2024 Olympics in France\u2014delineated an extensive list of Barbarians currently playing for elite provincial, national, and international teams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have 12 of our women playing for the Ontario Senior team. McKinley Hunt and Claire Gallagher are playing on Team Canada\u2019s Senior Women\u2019s team that is ranked #2 in the world. Andrew Quattrin is playing for the Senior Men\u2019s Team Canada. Unfortunately, Chloe Daniels won\u2019t be able to compete in the World Cup for the Senior Women\u2019s national team this year while she\u2019s rehabbing an injury, but she\u2019s here helping us by coaching. Our Senior players like Chloe do come back to coach\u2014it\u2019s part of our culture.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also part of the Barbs\u2019 culture is winning and Hall noted that the Senior Men\u2019s squad is off to a good start in 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur men\u2019s team is three games into the season. We had a big win against Toronto Scottish last week.  Our club also has a big series next weekend when we host Oshawa for six games right here at Sheppard\u2019s Bush.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three Aurora Barbarians RFC teams will take to the pitch on Saturday, June 7, starting at 9 a.m. when the U16 Girls host the Oshawa Vikings, followed by a Women\u2019s team doubleheader versus Oshawa at 10:30 AM and 12 PM.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Men\u2019s team tripleheader at 1:30, 3:00, and 4:30 rounds out the six-game series against the Vikings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All six matches will be played at the Sheppard\u2019s Bush turf field on Industrial Parkway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Jim Stewart<\/strong><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

670 rugby players braved windy and cool conditions at Sheppard\u2019s Bush and St. Maximilian Kolbe CHS to compete ardently in the Aurora Barbarians\u2019 annual Mini Youth Festival on Sunday. The 57-team Festival featured squads from across the GTA including the Caledon Cavaliers, Markham Irish, Barrie RC, Toronto Nomads, Oshawa Vikings, Ajax Wanderers, Burlington Centaurs, Toronto […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":36394,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[24,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-sports","category-sports"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/2025-06-05-06.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-9sZ","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-07 05:01:19","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36393"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36393\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36395,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36393\/revisions\/36395"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}