MLR Rugby
The favored Legion, in their second shot at a MLR title, again fell short again in heartbreaking fashion. Photo credit: @sdlegion via Twitter

The San Diego Legion needed one more win to cap a milestone-filled season, but couldn’t hold on Saturday in Chicago, dropping the Major League Rugby Championship to New England 25-24.

The Legion defense took a stand against the Free Jacks, until center Le Roux Malan, with less than four minutes to play and the Legion up 24-20, broke through. After catching a pass, he sailed past San Diego veteran Ma’a Nonu to score the game-winner.

The Free Jacks held off the Legion – hampered at times by turnovers and penalties – for the remainder of the game to claim their first MLR title, while denying San Diego its first.

Malan’s try came after a failed kick by the Legion’s Josh Henderson that would have extended his team’s lead. Henderson had replaced an injured Will Hooley.

“We managed to hold it together and win by one point,” Free Jack flanker Mitch Jacobson told Fox Sports. “It shows a lot of resilience for this team.”

New England’s coach, Scott Mathie, also to Fox Sports, concluded simply, “We just hung in there.”

The Free Jacks opened the scoring quickly, as Jacobson capitalized on a mistake by Nonu for his team’s first try. The close first half, though, saw the Legion bounce back, on tries by Christian Poidevin and Nate Augspurger and a penalty kick by Hooley, to take a 17-13 lead into the break.

It didn’t last as Paula Balekana scored to put the Free Jacks up 20-17. Augspurger answered at the 60-minute mark for the short-lived 24-20 lead.

The Legion produced a season for the record books in 2023, including setting marks for longest winning streak, which ended at 14 Saturday, and the most wins in a season (16), which New England tied with their title win.

San Diego, which debuted in 2018, is now 0-2 in MLR title games.

They lost the 2019 championship, another heartbreaker, to the Seattle Seawolves, following a score after a last-second scrum due to a San Diego penalty.

MLR’s most recent expansion team, the Chicago Hounds, welcomed more than 10,103 fans, a record for the league’s title game, to SeatGeek Stadium in Bridgeview, Ill.