Rugby Canada Super League

Rugby Canada Super League
Sport	Rugby union
Founded	1998
No. of teams	13
Country(ies)	Canada
Most recent champion(s)	Saskatchewan Prairie Fire

The Rugby Canada Super League (RCSL or Super League) is a national, semi-professional rugby union competition in Canada. The league is deemed semi-professional due to the fact that some of the smaller clubs are paying foreign players to play for their side. However, the vast majority of the domestic players actually pay to play for their team. The Prairie Fire is by far the most liberal user of foreign professional players^{[citation needed]}. The competition was established in 1998 and has been played since on an annual basis, it is considered to be Canada's premier domestic rugby competition. The Super League clubs draw from provincial unions, and the clubs are divided into two divisions - Eastern and Western. There are currently 13 teams in competition.

Newfoundland Rock

[edit] Overview

Founded in 1998, the Super League is considered to be Canada's premier rugby competition. In fact, players on Canada's senior men's team are often chosen from Super League clubs.

The Super League draws its teams from provincial unions. Larger unions (BC, Alberta, and Ontario) have more than one representative team; these teams are drawn largely from provincial sub-unions. For example, the Calgary Rugby Union and Edmonton Rugby Union are sub-unions of the larger Alberta Rugby Union and have both been given representation in the Super League.

Teams are divided into Eastern and Western Divisions. Teams play each of the other teams in their division once. The top team in each division play each other for the national championship.

The league has seldom had identical membership from season to season, with teams who have membership occasionally electing not to play due to financial, logistical or level-of-play concerns. As of the 2006 season, the Fraser Valley Rugby Union of B.C. ("The Venom") and the Manitoba Rugby Union ("The Buffalo") have elected not to participate actively. This has created an unbalanced situation where the western division has five teams (therefore only four games in their season), while the eastern division has seven (six games). For information on the current year, see the article associated with the year in question (see "See also", below).

[edit] Teams

[edit] Western Division

• Calgary Mavericks
• Edmonton Gold
• Fraser Valley Venom (currently not taking part)
• Manitoba Buffalo (currently not taking part)
• Saskatchewan Prairie Fire
• Vancouver Island Crimson Tide
• Vancouver Wave

[edit] Eastern Division

• Newfoundland Rock
• New Brunswick Black Spruce
• Niagara Thunder
• Nova Scotia Keltics
• Ottawa Harlequins
• Quebec Caribou
• Toronto Xtreme (currently not taking part)

[edit] Champions

• 1998 — Vancouver Island Crimson Tide def. Nova Scotia Keiths
• 1999 — Vancouver Island Crimson Tide (23) def. Toronto Renegades (11)
• 2000 — Fraser Valley Venom (15) def. Nova Scotia Keltics (9)
• 2001 — Fraser Valley Venom (20) def. Toronto Renegades (14)
• 2002 — Vancouver Island Crimson Tide (6) def. Newfoundland Rock (3)
• 2003 — Calgary Mavericks (40) def. Toronto Xtreme (24)
• 2004 — Vancouver Island Crimson Tide (14) def. Newfoundland Rock (8)
• 2005 — Newfoundland Rock (26) def. Saskatchewan Prairie Fire (13)
• 2006 — Newfoundland Rock (28) def. Saskatchewan Prairie Fire (14)
• 2007 — Saskatchewan Prairie Fire (28) def. Niagara Thunder (12)

[edit] See also

• 2007 RCSL Season
• Canada national rugby union team
• Rugby union in Canada

[edit] External links

• Rugby Canada Super League
• Rugby Canada