Southland Boys’ High School made history earlier this month when they beat Westlake Boys’ to take home the prestigious Moascar Cup — the first national rugby title in the school’s 100-year history.
Mayor Nobby Clark congratulated the team, and said from a city perspective he was super proud for the team to get their name on that trophy.
Mr Clark also read a letter from the mayor of Invercargill’s sister city Kumagaya, Tetsuya Kobayashi, who wanted to pay homage to the efforts made by players and staff and the city of Invercargill which supported them.
The Kumagaya rugby team, the Saitama Wild Knights, were interested in making exchanges with Southland players, and the milestone opened doors for the SBHS XV team, Mr Clark said.
Team captain Gregor Rutledge said it was finally sinking in that the team were national champions.
"We can see the support from the community and the mayor, so that’s pretty special," he said.
"I don’t think people around the country would believe that a small Southland school would go up and compete against those Auckland schools, so even just getting to the top four is pretty special, but then competing against those top teams and coming out on top was even more special."
