Seattle returns favor to Utah Warriors as playoff hopes take hit

The Utah Warriors are hardly out of playoff contention after 14 rounds of Major League Rugby's 2023 season.

But they'll have plenty of work to do in their final two matches, and will need a little help, too.

Joe Mano scored two tries, but Seattle held the Utah Warriors to just 5 points in the second half to pull away for a 27-20 win Sunday night at Starfire Stadium in Tukwila, Washington to clinch a home playoff berth for the Seawolves with two weeks remaining.

"Any time we're playing Utah, you're going to get one kind of game: that's gritty," said Seattle captain Ben Landry, who scored what amounted to the match-winning try. "These guys are electric; we went down to Utah this season, and they gave us a proper shellacking. We felt like we owed them one, and it was a battle all the way until the whistle."

Ina Futi gave Seattle a 7-0 lead with a try just five minutes into the match, but Joel Hodgson flipped the field with one kick to set up the Warriors' response. The former Newcastle flyhalf booted cross-field to Joe Mano, whose off-load pass set up Bailey Wilson for a corner try that pulled Utah (9-5, 44 points) within 7-5 in the 18th minute.

Samu Mano responded immediately for the Seawolves (12-2, 58 points), barreling under the posts for an automatic-7. Then, after a penalty conversion from Caleb Makenne, Mano finished off a successful lineout with a quick-striking try in the 40th minute that gave Utah a 15-14 halftime lead.

The Seawolves regained the lead with back-to-back penalty kicks from Jordan Chait, and the defense held the Warriors scoreless en route to a 20-15 lead with just 10 minutes remaining. That's when Seattle wrapped up the victory, as Landry dotted it down in the 72nd minute to go up 27-15.

Mano scored his second try of the match in the 78th minute, his league-leading 14th try of the season, to pull Utah within 27-20 and clinch a bonus point for losing by 7 points or less.

But in what felt like a "win-and-you're-in" road tilt, the Warriors' loss weighed heavy. Utah's 44 points won't eliminate the team from playoff contention, but the upstart Warriors under first-year head coach Greg Cooper sit 4 points behind third-place Houston for the final postseason bid out of the Western Conference.

The SaberCats (9-5, 48 points) added a bonus point for scoring four tries in a 48-26 victory against the Toronto Arrows, and end the season with back-to-back games against Old Glory DC and the New England Freejacks — the top two teams in the East.

Utah finishes off the season with games against Chicago and New York — the Ironworkers are currently third in the East — and must now score four more points than Houston over its final two contests. Impossible? Not necessarily, though the SaberCats may be in pole position for the final bid from the west in the six-team Major League Rugby championship series.

That made earning at least an extra bonus point crucial for a Utah side that won 58% of possession against the Seawolves, but were held largely outside their own three-meter line by Seattle's 219 tackles.

"We pride ourselves on being a very physical team, and that's all well and good until you go up against another physical team," Landry told The Rugby Network after the match. "It's a dogfight, but that's why we're here ... We embrace it, and so do they. There were some proper shots out there."

Utah's home finale is next Saturday, June 10 against the last-place Chicago Hounds. Kickoff from Zions Bank Stadium is scheduled for 8 p.m. MDT.

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