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SPORTS

New coaching staff helps women's rugby to success

By Sean Dolan
Norwich Guidon Staff Writer

A stampede of Norwich women rugby players try to make it to the goal in their tough loss against UVM Oct. 16. (Plourde photo)

The Norwich Women’s Rugby team placed third out of nine teams at the Beantown Tournament, hosted by UMASS Amherst.

During the tournament, the Women’s Rugby team beat Bowden, Southern Connecticut, and received a forfeit from M.I.T., only losing to St. Josephs by two points.

Women’s Rugby is led by new Head Coach Austin Hall, who also coaches men’s and women’s high school teams. On the field, the team is also led by Captain Becky Bagley.

Josephine Quijano, 21, a senior and also a first-year player on the team, said that, “At the tournament, we went in there really strong, and we were aggressive. We really felt prepared.”

The team needed to be well-prepared and confident coming into this tournament.

“We have a very short season, so it’s hard to show the school, but we have a new coach that is the best,” said Stephanie Hurley, 19, a sophomore, second-year player, from Brookfield, Mass.

“Most of the matches, we played very well. We played very well as a team.”

Fatigue seemed to set in after the team played so many games back to back.

“The only match we actually lost, you could tell we definitely could have done a lot better,” Hurley said.

UVM women rugby players try to drag down a Norwich player in the loss to UVM. The women’s next game will be home against WPI on Oct. 23. (Plourde photo)

“We have a lot of practices, hard practices. Our new coach this year likes to do a lot of conditioning, so we are faster than a lot of teams that we play,” Hurley said. “That allows us to keep going in games when they are slowing down.”

Jacqueline Meehan, 21, a three-year veteran on the team, said, “We had a very good team, last year. We came back with a lot of experienced players. We also came back with a new coach and a little bit of a new style of play.”

The team had to combine their experience with the new tactics of Coach Hall in order to become successful.

“We did a real great job at integrating that style of play in this weekend. We have only been practicing for two weeks, and we already look better than we have in the past three years,” Meehan said.

They have players who have played with each other before; they can pick up on each other's strengths and weaknesses, helping the team play better.

“I certainly believe that the new coach is a big factor in why we’re playing so well. Last year, it was a lot of us coaching ourselves, but this year, Austin has brought in some outside perspectives and picked up on our strengths. He’s helped us overcome our weaknesses,” said senior Melissa Luciano.

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