Some day San Diego will win another professional sports championship. That day is not today.
The San Diego Legion lost to the Seattle Seawolves 26-23 on the final play of the match in the Major League Rugby Championship Game in front of a packed Torero Stadium.
The Seawolves won the inaugural MLR title in 2018. The Legion beat them twice in the regular season but in a championship setting experience absolutely matters.
The Legion took a 6-0 lead on a pair of kicks by Joe Pietersen but then they had a couple of defnesive breakdowns that led to a pair of Seattle tries and a 14-6 Seawolves lead at halftime.
In the 2nd half the Legion started chipping away at Seattle's defense, which is so good it earned the nickname "Sea Wall." San Diego got within a point when Nick Boyer got loose on the sideline and ran in for a try to make it a 14-13 game.
With 16 minutes left the Legion took the lead back when they pushed a scrum deep into Seattle territory and Jordan Manihera was able to dive over the end line for another try and a 20-14 advantage.
The defending champs came right back with a try of their own but Brock Staller, who led Major League Rugby in scoring, missed the conversion kick short so the Legion kept a 20-19 lead.
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With three minutes left Pieterson snuck a drop-kick through the uprights to make it a 4-point game so Seattle needed a try to save their repeat bid.
That's exactly what they got. The Seawolves moved a scrum a full 10 meters for the championship-winning try as time expired.
