DRFC Rucks Over UMass

by Tommy Monahan

A well-saturated pitch once again greeted the men in green on Saturday as the Dartmouth Rugby Club played host to the University of Massachusetts at Amherst Minutemen. Kickoff came at 11 on the Dartmouth Rugby Club’s new Brophy pitch, flanked by the Corey Ford Rugby Clubhouse. The first Dartmouth score came early, in the 3rd minute as a Dartmouth lineout connected with a crashing All-American 8-man Joe Killefer who found a gap for flyhalf Jesse Blom to score making it 7 – 0 after Andrew Caspary’s conversion. At this point, misfortune struck the Dartmouth team as a head to head collision between flanker Mark Goodson and prop Omar Foda gave Foda a serious concussion that induced a seizure. Foda was rushed to the nearby Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center where after testing he was released that afternoon and is making a speedy recovery. However, the loss of Foda is a serious blow to the Dartmouth pack just before the playoffs—as he is an integral member of the tight-five who’s punishing tackles and explosive rucks will be missed on the pitch.

After the injury delay, the Dartmouth team came out firing as in the 7th minute as Dartmouth scrum on their 40 meter gave Killefer a line break. He then dished the ball to center Scott Penner, who found center Nick Stack, who eventually spun the ball wide to the team’s newest speedster, Aziz Sayigh who dashed the last 22 meters into the tryzone. Again, Caspary was true making the score 14 – 0. As play continued the Dartmouth pack once again showed their grit in the 18th minute, as the men in green stole a UMASS ball in the scrum that 8-man Killefer ran through traffic to make the score 19 – 0. While Caspary missed the conversion on the try, Caspary made the score 22 – 0 in the 23rd minute by kicking for points off of a Minutemen penalty. The half ended with a great deal of back and forth play. Dartmouth missed another penalty kick but Dartmouth also repelled a strong Minutemen attack in the closing minutes of the second half as lock Brent Clayton was sin binned for delay of game and gave UMASS the ball within 10 meters of the Dartmouth tryzone. Inspired defense by the men in green kept UMASS out of the tryzone, making the score at halftime 22-3.

The second half began with much the same back and forth action. Promising Dartmouth attacks were hampered by sloppy play in the wet conditions, but strong defense kept the Minutemen deep in their territory. Dartmouth again found a breakthrough in the 66th minute when their pack stole another UMASS scrum and Killefer found the tryzone for the second time that day—Caspary was again good on the conversion. Dartmouth put the final mark on the board in the 74th minute off of a stolen UMASS lineout on the Dartmouth 22 meter. The quick steal was taken into phase play and two rucks later the backline sent the ball spinning down the line to Penner who entered in the corner but found his way under the posts for the try. Another conversion by Caspary made the final score 36 – 0, capping an excellent day for Dartmouth.

This weekend marks Homecoming and the first week of playoffs as Dartmouth faces Yale at home on Brophy field at 1, in an elimination match. This year marks the first time the New England Rugby Union will use a new and peculiar playoff format to determine their representatives in the Northeast playoffs. While previously the top three teams form the more competitive white league and the top team from the lower green league were given seeds into the playoffs. This year the top four teams from each league playoff in an elimination during the first week of playoffs, then the following week the victorious teams face each other to determine seeding going into playoffs. While this system seems to dilute the importance of regular season play, the new structure does promise to deliver some extremely exciting rugby as top teams try to win or end their seasons short.