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Sandy • BYU is the national champion in collegiate rugby for the fourth-straight year.
The Cougars led wire-to-wire and held off a late California rally to beat the Bears 30-27 at Rio Tinto Stadium for the Penn Mutual Varsity Cup crown.
BYU has now won five national championships in rugby.
BYU took a 7-0 lead just seven minutes into the match on a try by Seki Kofe and Jonny Linehan's kick.
The Cougars struck again four minutes later when Linehan made a penalty kick to make it 10-0 for BYU.
Cal trimmed it to 10-3 on Jake Anderson's penalty kick 15 minutes into the match.
The Cougars completed the first-half scoring at the 24:50 mark when Josh Anderson, a former University of Utah football player, broke free for a try after a nice pass from Josh Whippy, a running back on BYU's football team.
Linehan's kick made it 17-3 BYU at halftime.
Cal came out strong in the second half, though, scoring twice to trim BYU's lead to 17-15 just nine minutes into the half.
The Cougars took a 27-15 lead when Jared Whippy caught Linehan's kick in the try zone, but Cal's Michael Bush answered moments later to cut it to 27-20.
Linehan's long penalty kick with 15 minutes left gave BYU a 30-20 lead.
Twitter: @drewjay