As in the past, the Men’s Open Social division is the most heavily attended and with 32 teams this year, we created two 16-team competitions.
In Men’s Social 1, the Chicago Condors and Chicago Riot took the top-two seeds in pool play, each with 11 tries and 3-0-0 records.
Krakens were also undefeated in the seeding round averaging 3 tries per match.
The Pandas emerged as the 4th seed from the most competitive bracket with a 2-0-1 record having played to one of the few draws all day.
Despite the 4th place ranking, the Pandas had managed to 9 tries when qualifying for the semi-final, and presented a strong challenge to the Condors. At the final whistle, the Condors maintained only a 5-point lead in the exciting 26-21 barn-burner.
On the other side of the table, the 3rd-seeded Krakens upset 2nd-seeded Chicago Riot with a confident 28-0 performance.
However, the success of the underdogs was to be short-lived.
In the final, Krakens struggled on attack and managed only a single, unconverted try while Condors ran up the scoreboard. Although conversions were rare for both sides, the Condors took the championship with a comfortable 22-5 margin.