Women's Rugby | 9/2/2017 6:00:00 PM
LETHBRIDGE, Alberta- The Central Washington women's rugby team opened their 2017 campaign with a 34-31 victory over the University of Alberta Saturday afternoon.
"As a senior I believe that this was the best first game we have ever had," senior prop
Samantha Pinson said. "The communication was great and everyone had an awesome attitude about playing today. The chemistry feels amazing."
Alberta jumped out to a 7-0 lead early in the match before sophomore
Suiluana A'au broke through the try line to get the Wildcats on the board. Central continued its offensive attack as sophomore scrum half
Spencer Boldt offloaded to
Yana Manoa who broke through the Golden Bear's defense to give the Wildcats their first lead of the match.
Leah Ingold would extend CWU's scoring margin to 15-7 before Alberta tallied a pair of tries to reclaim the lead and enter halftime up 19-15.
Central Washington struck first in the second stanza as redshirt freshman
Mikayla Roberts punched into the try zone from five yards out and
Emma Leonard added to the Wildcat's advantage with a successful conversion.
Alberta would regain the lead late in the second half, but the Wildcats refused to lie down. Trailing 29-31, A'au caught a pass from
Michel Navarro and surged past the try line for her third time in the contest to give Central a 34-31 victory.
"Something that went really well was our defense," A'au said. "Whenever I was on, or off, the field I could constantly hear my teammates talking and calling their hit. Though there is still improvement to come, we played really well as a team with many new faces. Alberta was a tough team to play against and they definitely made us fight to come out with a win."
"We did well playing off of each other and being creative," senior Jenny Johnson said. "I was really impressed with how quickly we came together and supported one another. We definitely can improve communicating on defense and coming up together."
"The forwards did well to win our line out deep in their end," Johnson continued. "We played a few phases that pulled their defense in. Michel did well to stick her defender and Sui finished it off strong."
The Wildcats will return to the rugby pitch tomorrow afternoon in Canada to square off against the University of Lethbridge. Kickoff is scheduled for 3 p.m.
-CWU-
