North American Rugby Database

Report

The New York Exiles host their East Coast rivals the Boston Banshees at Mount Vernon Memorial Stadium during Round 10 of the 2026 WER season!

After meeting in the opening round of the season, these two teams meet once again in the final round of the regular season, this time in New York. These two teams kicked off the 2026 WER season, with the Boston Banshees taking a comfortable 38-19 victory to give them a 2-1 lead in the all-time series between these two sides. Both teams have had up and down seasons in 2026, the Banshees picked up that first win, but have struggled since then and sit 5th with a 2-7 record and it’s a similar story for last year’s runners-up, the New York Exiles. The Exiles are sitting 4pts ahead of the Banshees with a 3-6 record, with two of their wins coming in the last 4 games including an impressive victory over a strong TC Gemini side in Round 6. The Exiles cannot challenge the Gemini for 3rd place here, but would like to secure the 4th place spot with a victory over their east coast rivals. With a bonus point victory the Banshees could beat out the Exiles to 4th however, so there’s still some jeopardy in this one, even if it’s not for the Legacy Cup.

The game started relatively slowly, with both sides evenly matched and testing each other out. The visiting Boston Banshees opened the scoring after 10 minutes through Captain Paige Stathopoulos, and Amanda Wild’s conversion gave them a 7-0 lead. This lone try would be the only score through the first quarter of the game, but in the 24th minute Emma Santosuosso extended the lead for the Banshees which was immediately cancelled out by the Exiles’ first score of the game through Carly Lehman, converted by Jetta Owens to take the score to 7-12 in Boston’s favour. Bar those two tries in the same minute, the scoring was few and far between in the first half but right before the break, the Exiles took the lead as the boot of Owens converted a Caitlyn Caldon score to give New York a narrow 14-12 lead at the half.

These two sides would trade scores through the second half, with both sides dotting down twice, but the Exiles slowly extending their lead from the clinical goal kicking of Jetta Owens. The Exiles led 28-17 before the Banshees secured a bonus point try in the 66th minute, but the conversion was off target and Boston were unable to shift the scoreboard any further. The New York Exiles take this one by a score of 28-22, splitting the season series with the Boston Banshees, just as they did in 2025.

The Exiles finish the 2026 WER season in 4th place with a 4-6 record, picking up 3 of those wins in the back half of the season. They finish on an island, 14pts adrift of the 3rd place TC Gemini but 7pts ahead of the Boston Banshees, who secure 5th place with a pair of bonus points in this game, falling to 2-8 on the season with 13pts.