Women's Rugby Holds off West Chester

In its second weekend of action and its first official contest of the regular season, the Harvard women’s rugby team (1-0) came out on top against perennial national championship contender and two-time semifinalist West Chester (0-1). Playing on the Golden Rams’ home turf, the Crimson scored four tries en route to a 23-17 victory.

Coming off a weekend where the team split games with the University of Prince Edward Island and Bowdoin in a preseason round robin tournament, the team traveled to West Chester in hopes of replicating a win against a familiar opponent. Harvard defeated the Golden Rams, 22-5, a little over a year ago.

According to captain Hope Schwartz, a former Crimson sports editor, the win brought together a lot of what the team has practiced during the preseason.

“Unlike last weekend where there were a few really brilliant individual performances, this weekend we just had the team working really, really hard,” Schwartz said. “[We were] winning our scrums, winning our line outs, and just being really efficient at the point of contact.”

Sophomore Haley Langan put Harvard on the board with her first scores of the season as she tallied two back-to-back tries in the first half to give her side an early lead. West Chester, however, would rally with a pair of tries themselves from junior wing Sophia Schwab.

The game would go back and forth until Harvard scored on a try by junior Claire Collins to take a slim 15-12 lead before the Crimson rallied following a mistake from the Golden Rams.

“Their fly-half missed a kick, and the ball bounced into the try zone, and our wing Mariah was able to get to the ball first for a try,” Schwartz said. “I think that’s a really good example of our team being really aware of what’s happening.”

The error would cost West Chester a try as Harvard would then take a 20-12 lead, but the Golden Rams stayed in the game, finding the end zone in the 77th minute to bring themselves within three.

Despite the rally, the Crimson held off West Chester long enough to earn its first victory of the regular season.

The win was one head coach Sue Parker attributed to a complete team effort, but also to an exceptionally strong performance by the team’s eight forwards.

“It was really the forward unit that set the platform for the team’s victory,” Parker said. “Where we really demoralized West Chester and won the mental aspect of the battle was in the scrum.”

In an especially physical game, Harvard’s forwards managed to win a lot of their scrums and maintain ball control in what proved to be a very close game.

For a young squad with six freshmen and eight sophomores, the win against a seasoned opponent such as West Chester was important for growing in the eyes of Schwartz. Since Harvard’s season is mixed with matches against varsity and club teams, a win against West Chester is significant.

“West Chester is another varsity team and a very good varsity team. For us, this is a very high stakes game for a few reasons,” Schwartz said. “One, because we have a chance to prove our worth against a very formidable varsity opponent, and two, because we got to work on a lot of things going into the start of our Ivy League season.”

Coach Parker echoed the thought as well.

“I think it’s a win we can feel really proud of in terms of our team’s ability to step up and face a national opponent,” Parker said. “I think the team showed a mental toughness today that bodes well for us going into our Ivy conference schedule next week.”

The Crimson returns to Cambridge for its first home match of the season against fellow Ancient Eight competitor Yale on Sept. 19.

—Staff writer Troy Boccelli can be reached at tboccelli@college.harvard.edu.