HONOURS have continued to be spread around the area's schools in the Champion Schools rugby league qualifying festivals.

These festivals, organised by York City Knights community development team, decide who represents North Yorkshire in the regional stage of the nationwide tournament.

Years 8 and 9 results have already been reported (these were in Park Life, October 7), while Year 7 needed a second finals night, detailed below.

In Year 11, Millthorpe School came out on top, being the only team to remain undefeated in the round-robin event.

Canon Lee were the only team to take a point off Millthorpe, yet finished fourth of the five teams, with Joseph Rowntree School taking runners-up spot and Archbishop Holgate finishing third.

Oaklands headed the Year 10 qualifyers. They won all their five games, scoring 60 points in the process.

Second-placed Millthorpe only lost once, but were also held to a draw by fifth-placed Joseph Rowntree - which indicated the closeness of the competition.

The Year 7 finals festival took place at Oaklands this week. Four York schools, plus Barlby, who came through the Selby section, qualified for this festival, and it saw Canon Lee come out on top.

They drew their first game against Oaklands but won all three games thereafter, while Oaklands finished second after losing to Burnholme in their penultimate match.

This festival was slightly different to the previous Year 7 event as it involved 13-a-side games with scrums (albeit non-competitive) to prepare the schools for the regional stages.

The number of teams involved overall has continued to rise, from 36 last year to 42, and Knights development chief Jason Ramshaw said: "A couple of years ago there was possibly one school dominating but that's different now. All teams are improving and it's encouraging that more kids are wanting to play."