Canadian women dominate Australia in Pacific Four Series rugby win

The Canadian Press

· Posted: May 23, 2025 8:46 AM EDT | Last Updated: 34 minutes ago

Defending champion Canada ran successful 7 tries en way to a lopsided 45-7 women's rugby triumph implicit Australia successful Brisbane connected Friday, completing an unbeaten tally done the Pacific Four Series.

The second-ranked Canadians indispensable present await the result of No. 3 New Zealand's location crippled against the ninth-ranked U.S. connected Saturday successful North Harbour to spot whether they clasp their title.

Canada and New Zealand went into the last circular tied connected 8 points aft their 27-27 gully past Saturday successful Christchurch. But New Zealand held the tiebreaker borderline implicit Canada — a plus-26 points differential compared to plus-12 for Canada.

The Canadians (2-0-1) achieved their extremity Friday by defeating Australia (1-2-0), scoring 4 tries for a bonus constituent and moving up the score. A New Zealand bonus-point triumph Saturday and the rubric volition beryllium decided by points differential.

Canada's points differential present stands astatine plus-50. But the Black Ferns volition undoubtedly adhd to their differential, having thumped the U.S. 57-5 erstwhile they met successful past year's Pacific Four Series.

"Obviously, we would person loved to get that triumph against New Zealand past weekend, but we had to determination on," said Canada skipper Alex Tessier. "It was a abbreviated turnaround to this week. Friday came rapidly but wide I was precise arrogant of the girls today. It was a decent win. We enactment a batch of points connected the board."

Canada improved to 7-0-0 all-time against No. 6 Australia.

Canada dominated acceptable pieces, pushing backmost the Wallaroos successful the scrum and winning lineouts. The Canadians led 26-0 astatine the fractional and could person added to the lead, with different effort called backmost for obstruction and handling errors ending different attacks.

McKinley Hunt, Karen Paquin, Julia Schell, Laetitia Royer, Krissy Scurfield, skipper Alex Tessier and Fabiola Forteza scored tries for Canada. Schell booted 5 conversions.

Desi Miller scored Australia's effort with Faitala Moleka adding the conversion.

The 2 teams could conscionable again successful the World Cup quarterfinals this summertime successful England.

Canada had mislaid conscionable 1 of its 9 erstwhile matches (7-1-1) portion the Wallaroos had won 5 of their past six.

Canada opened tourney play with a 26-14 triumph implicit the U.S. connected May 2 successful Kansas City. Australia mislaid its opener 38-12 to New Zealand successful Newcastle, Australia, earlier bouncing backmost to bushed the U.S. 27-19 successful Canberra.

All 4 Pacific Four Series teams are preparing for the World Cup, which kicks disconnected Aug. 22 successful England. The Canadians person been drawn successful Pool B with No. 7 Scotland, No. 10 Wales and No. 16 Fiji.

Canada's adjacent games are against No. 12 South Africa successful Pretoria connected July 5 and Gqeberha connected July 12. Its last tune-up is Aug. 9 against No. 5 Ireland successful Belfast.

Canada won past year's Pacific Four Series with its first-ever triumph implicit New Zealand, defeating the Black Ferns 22-19 successful Christchurch. The Canadian women had mislaid each 17 meetings with New Zealand earlier that.

Canada besides won the inaugural Pacific Four Series successful 2021, erstwhile the lawsuit consisted of a two-game bid with the U.S. owed to COVID question restrictions. The Canadians finished runner-up to New Zealand successful 2022 and 2023 erstwhile the contention was expanded to 4 teams.

Canada improved to 12-5-1 since losing 36-0 to France successful the third-place crippled astatine the World Cup successful November 2022. Four of those losses were to England, with the different to New Zealand.