It's getting down to crunch time in the Boys Grade here at SAS Secondary School Nationals as teams fight for the right to contest finals tomorrow.

Hamilton Boys High are always one of the heavy hitters at Nationals, and they faced Kings High School of Dunedin - one of the best teams from the South Island.

After a physical start, it took quite awhile for Hamilton to test the Kings defence with Maanaki Heta getting the first touchdown of the match for Hamilton after around 10 minutes of play.

Kieran Lee and Morgan Harper also added touchdowns for Hamilton as they took a 3-0 lead into halftime.

Kings battled hard and had plenty of opportunities to attack, with Josh Duff and Taylor Haugh their best players in the middle of the park.

Despite some smart set plays, Kings couldn't break through a tough Hamilton defence, and would fall behind by another two touchdowns as Karena Thompson-Reed and Tyler Riki-Pahewa gave Hamilton a solid lead.

Kings finally got one back through Tom Pledger, who got on the outside of his man and dived over the line for a nice score.

Hamilton added some extra to the scoreline by getting another three touchdowns near the end of the game. Josef Meek and Ifor Jones putting in some good work to close out the match and continue to look like one of the favourites in the Boys Grade.

Final score:

Hamilton Boys: 8

Kings High School: 1