Match Recap
|
Match Recap |
|
|
|
Home
|
APRIL 21-22: National Cahmpionship Finals LU – 18 Furman University – 31 LU – 28 Allegheny College – 20
Longwood traveled tot he campus of Wake forest University to play in the Division III National Championships. In the First semi-final of the day, LU faced Furman who has won this event three time in the past. The first half was a tremendous display of rugby by both teams and LU held the halftime lead 18-14. Unfortunately, three injuries in ten minutes to Todd Miller, Neal Hurst and James Rasnake hurt the ffort and Furman won 31-18. Chris Davis scored two tries and was named man-of-the-match.
LU played Sunday in the third place game against Allegheny College who had lost 83-0 Saturday to Bentley. This was much more light-hearted affair and a chance to shine for the seniors. Three early tries by Justin Mulkey, Todd Miller and Pat Gorham gave LU a 21-3 lead and the rest was hard fought but ultimately a solid victory for LU. The victory gave LU third place in Division III USA Rugby.
APRIL 7-8: Cherry Blossom Tournament LU – 12 U.Va. - 5 LU – 13 Yale 12
The Men's Rugby Team traveled to Washington DC over Easter weekend to compete in the 41st Cherry Blossom Rugby Tournament. The event features college and High School teams from all over the country. This is a very prestigious tournament and entry is by invitation only. With Division I teams like Virginia, Rice University, Cornell, Drexel, Air Force Academy, Fordham, West Virginia and Temple and 20 others; Longwood was definitely the small fish in a big pond.
First up was UVa. Longwood has only played UVa. on one previous occasion and the scored was tied 5-5. This time 2 inches of snow was added to make the game interesting. In the end it was not so interesting (for Virginia) as Longwood went out to a 12-3 lead and held on to claim the 12-10 victory over the Cavaliers. Next up was Ivy League Champion Cornell. Although LU dominated the game and played in the shadow of the opposing goal for over 25 minutes, they could not put in the equalizing score. With score 5-0 for Cornell, one final mistake gave Cornell the 12-0 win.
Sunday morning Longwood played Rice University from Texas. This was the only game of the weekend where LU could not muster a stout challenge and Rice won 19-0. Longwood was now in the consolation bracket and would face University of California (PA) first. With all players giving a cohesive effort, LU came back to its winning ways with a 26-0 win. In the semi-finals LU would play Yale (yes, that one in New Haven!). A mistake on the kick-off gave Yale the lead 5-0 , 30 seconds into the game. The teams traded scores and Yale led at halftime 12-5. Midway through the second half LU would score a penalty to close the gap to 12-8. Some desp erate attacking and defending made for a tremendous game of rugby. Finally as time expired, Longwood's James Rasnake put in the winning score to finish a 13-12 victory.
After five games of rugby in two days, there was one last game to play for the consolation championship against Slippery Rock University (PA). Unfortunately, early mistakes led to easy scores and Longwood was down 24-0. A huge effort got the score back to 24-12 but some key refereeing decisions and lack of time ended the comeback.
The team finished 15th of the 28 teams entered with 3 wins and 3 losses. This placed them ahead of every pther Virginia Rugby Union team in the event and ahead of Division I teams like Northeastern and Drexel. Literally hundreds of fans, players and coaches asked “Where is Longwood University”. The high school teams in particular wanted information. Each time the players represented themselves and the university extremely well. The invitation to the men and women of Longwood Rugby was extended and accepted for the 2008 tournament.
MARCH 24: LU – 35 VCU 12 LU traveled to Richmond to face VCU in what has become a rivalry for both teams. VCU was out manned from the beginning and tries from Todd Miller and Michael Ragin led LU to the victory. FEBRUARY 24: LU – 32 University of Mary Washingtion -17 Pat Gorham directed the offense with precision kicking to lead the Longwood Men's rugby Club to a 32-17 victory over Division II rival University of Mary Washington.
Game Summary Lineup: L. Reid, D. Talley, B. Hancock, N. Hurst, A. Gilchrist, T. Miller, C. Foster, B. Lynch, M. Ragin, P. Gorham, J. Mulkey(Captain), R. Ballinger, D. Crites, C. Davis, S. Davis Substitutes:M. Revelle, M. LaRocca, M. Ross, J. Rasnake Tries:Mulkey, S. Davis(2), C.Davis, Crites Conversions: Miller(2) Panalties: Miller Halftime Score: LU 22 - UMW 12
B-Side loses to UMW 12-5 Lineup: J. Rasnake, J. Maeden, J. Reed, J. Canabius, E.McKinney, J. Singer, M. Porada, T. Lankford, R. Miller Tries: Rasnake FEBRUARY 17, 2007: LU- 45 University of Richmond - 5 Neal Hurst took the opening kickoff, passed to Todd Miller who passed to Chris Davis and 15 seconds into the game Longwood had a 5-0 lead over the visiting University of Richmond Spiders in Saturday's game at First Avenue. That was as close as this game was going to be. While not as dominating as some performances in the past year, Longwood was clearly a better team than UR and had raised the level on effort in this game compared to the previous week's against VMI. As the first half moved on Miller would score a try and convert to move the total to 12-0. UR scored their lone try to make it 12-5. With 7 minutes left in the first half, LU scored off of a set play from the line out and drove 25 yards where Brian “Spanky” Lynch touched the ball down. This play proved to be the back breaker and LU never looked back. Second half scores from Ryan Ballinger, “Rock” Hancock, another from Miller, a 50 yard run from Dan Crites along with 5 from 7 kicking conversions from Miller gave the final total of 45-5.
FEBRUARY 10, 2007: LU- 26 VMI - 27 Last Spring, Virginia Military Institute (VMI) came to Farmville and lost to Longwood 31-10. That game was the first game in a winning streak that reached ten games and culminated in the Territorial Championship in November. VMI continued on its own winning streak and placed second in the Virginia Rugby Union and earned a place in the Territorial playoff for Division II (Longwood plays Division III.). Both teams faced off Saturday in their season opener in preparation for their final runs at National Championships. The game was a battle from the beginning. The first ten minutes was dominated with LU wining rucks and lineouts and culminating with Chris Davis scoring at the 10 minute mark. The Todd Miller conversion gave LU a 7-0 lead. VMI came back strong and pushed over a score to close the gap to 7-5. Numerous handling errors and stout defense kept the high scoring LU offense at bay. In the 30th minute center Davis scored again off a perfect sequence passes to give the home team a 14-5 lead. VMI again came back and scored near the end of the half leaving LU up 14-12 at the break. The second half was more of the same. A try by Matt Ross followed by a penalty goal by VMI gave the Keydets the lead 20-19 with 15 minutes left. With 12 minutes left in the game Todd Miller put in a try and conversion to give LU the lead 26-20. Unfortunately, LU could not hold out a determined VMI attack and they scored and converted for a 27-26 lead with 7 minutes to play. A furious rally fell just short and the winning streak was over. The men's next game will be this coming Saturday on the first Avenue field against the University of Richmond at 1pm.
NOVEMBER 6, 2006: 17 TIRES – 2 SHUTOUTS – 1 CHAMPIONSHIP! In a stunning display of rugby, the Longwood Men's rugby team defeated the College of William and Mary (W&M) 62-0 and Old Dominion University (ODU) 49-0 to claim the Virginia Rugby Union Championship in games played Saturday and Sunday. The game were played at the Ed Lee Cup tournament held annually to determine the VRU champions. The team awoke Saturday to surprisingly cold weather to make the trip to Richmond to face W&M int he first semi-final. With Longwood seeded #1 and W&M #4, W&M had little to lose and put up strong resistance for the first 15 minutes of the game. Justin Mulkey started the scoring with a scoring run up the middle. After that and for the remainder of the game, Longwood scored almost a point a minute while W&M rarely crossed midfield. By the end of the game Mulkey had scored 3 tries and Todd Miller scored 4 tries. With one try each from Byron Trafton, John Clegg and Tim Knowles, conversions from Miller (3) and Steve Davis(2) and Clegg , the final score stood at 62-0. The only question was who would be the opponent in the finals. ODU played Washington and Lee (W&L) in the second semi-final. Earlier in the season W&L had defeated ODU 29-5 and was seeded #2 behind Longwood. But ODU had made a late season run including a 62-0 rout of Christopher Newport University and promised to make the semi-final an interesting game. Tied at halftime 7-7, ODU proved the stronger and more consistent team and score three second half tries to give them the victory at 29-7 setting up the ODU-Longwood final. Clearly, ODU had improved and promised to be a tougher opponent than the one Longwood had defeated 32-12 the 6 weeks ago in September. With that in mind, Longwood choose a more conservative strategy early in the game, opting to kick two Stephen Davis penalty goals to take an early lead 6-0. Longwood kept the pressure on with some excellent play calling and ball handling from Pat Gorham. At the 17 minute mark, Ryan Ballinger pushed over the first try of the day. Tim Knowles and John Clegg scored and Stephen Davis converted to make the score at halftime 25-0. With last year's championship loss in mind, Longwood worked hard to leave no doubt who the best team was. Two tries by Todd Miller, one more by Clegg and one by Chris Davis and conversions by Stephen Davis ran the final total to 49-0. The try by Clegg was the try of the day. After a chip kick from Gorham landed softly. Clegg scooped up the ball and scored. Although they did not score, the remainder of the forward pack of Neal Hurst, Matt Earst, Jordan Boze, Brian Lynch, Ryan Russell, Mike LaRocca, Matt Ross, Brain Hancock, Chris Foster and Antwon Gilchrist consistently won the ball in rucks and mauls and played ferocious defense in the shutouts while Mark Forseman provided service so Pat Gorham could run the offense. This was truly a team effort. The final totals for the season were overwhelming. In 8 games overall, Longwood shutout the opponents 5 times outscoring them overall 361-22. Additionally, Longwood placed two players, Todd miller and Justin Mulkey, on the VRU Select Side. They will compete for spots on Territorial and National All-star teams. Longwood next will travel to Baltimore, Maryland to face champion of the Eastern Pennsylvania Rugby Union (EPRU) for the Mid Atlantic Territorial championship on November 19th. The EPRU championship is between Penn State and Widener University. (The result is too late to be reported). The winner of that game will play in the United Sates Rugby Union final four to be held in the spring. The 2006 Longwood Men's Rugby Club Roster: Ben Adams, Ryan Ballinger, Jordan Boze, John Cabauiss, Dan Cheatham, John Clegg, Dan Crites, Stephen Curry, Chris Davis, Stephen Davis, Brandon Dye, Matt Ernst, Larry Fightmaster, Mark Foresman, Chris Foster, Antwon Gilchrist, Pat Gorham, Brian Hancock, Greg Hopkins, Neal Hurst, Eddie Johnston, Tim Knowles, Mike LaRocca, Brian Lynch, Eddie Mckinney, Todd Miller, Justin Mulkey, Mike Ragin, John Reed, Logan Reid, Matt Revelle, Matt Ross, Ryan Russell, Justin Singer, Zach Smith, Byron Trafton, Mike Wichterman
OCTOBER 5, 2006: LU – 63 Hampden-Sydney College- 0 Men's rugby extended its dominance over Division rivals with a 63-0 victory over Hampden-Sydney this week in a mid-week fixture that featured eleven tries by Danial Cheatham, David Patterson, Jordon Boze, Brandon Dye, Mike LaRocca, Todd Miller, Donald Lamar, Tim Knowles(2) and Ed McKinney(2) and conversions by Pat Gorham and Byron Trafton. With a halftime score of 22-0 LU stepped up the attack and scored 41 second half points. Since HSC is a social team and not part of the Virginia Rugby Union league structure Longwood played mostly reserves in the friendly match. In addition to the try scorers, excellent performances were turned in by Matt Ross, Ryan Ballinger and Mark Forseman, Antwon Gilchrist, Eddie Johnson, Chris Davis and Zach Smith. For their tireless efforts Ross, Ballinger and Forseman were named men-of-the-match. This recent victory puts LU at 197 points scored in four games with only 17 scored against including two shutouts. LU is 4-0 overall and 2-0 against league foes (Old Dominion and Christopher Newport) and has already qualified for the state championship playoffs in Richmond on November 4-5. The team has two league games remaining against William and Mary in Williamsburg on October 21 and Washington and Lee in Farmville on October 28. Washington and Lee is also currently undefeated in league play this season and should prove a good test in a game that will probably will determine the #1 seed for the state playoffs. The Women's team also has two games remaining against William and Mary on October 21 in Williamsburg and October 28 against Radford in Radford. Currently the women are 0-3 but with wins in these two games the women will also qualify for the state championship playoffs. New players are always welcome to both the men's and women's teams and play will continue the remainder of the fall and through the spring.
OCTOBER 21, 2006: LU – 34 W&M - 0 After a layoff for the Fall break and a reserves match against Hampden-Sydney College, the first side of the Men's Rugby Club returned to action with a convincing 34-0 win over conference rival William and Mary. W & M was one of the pre-season favorites to challenge Longwood for the conference championship but has struggled and failed to win any games in the league this fall. This match was to prove they belong with the leagues best and able to make the playoffs. Early on the combination of W & M fierce play and the rust of Longwood's long layoff made for a very tight game. Longwood spent ten minutes in the W & M end but could not score and finally settled for Todd Miller penalty kick to take a 3-0 lead. W &M Fought back but by now Longwood was finding its rhythm and attacks to the outside. At the 21 minute mark, Dan Crites escaped the last defender to score (conversion missed) to move LU to an 8-0 lead. As half-time approached and Longwood still applying pressure, Todd Miller broke free to score his team leading 10th try of the season which he converted to make the halftime score 15-0.
At the 10 minute mark of the second half, Greg 'Tupperware' Hopkins sustained a broken leg and the game was halted while the injury was treated and Hopkins was moved to the hospital. After the delay Longwood seemed to take inspiration and scored tries from Stephen Davis and Eddie Johnston. With the conversions the 29-0 score secured the outcome. The last five minutes of the game saw one great effort started by a kick to the corner from Flyhalf Pat Gorham. The kick was tracked down by Justin Mulkey and Ryan Ballinger who made several tackles each to get the ball back to the support of the rest of the team where finally, Brian 'Spanky' Lynch score the final try for Longwood. Stephen Davis's tackling and penetrating runs earned him Man-of-the-match honors The win sets up a final showdown next week at home with Washington and Lee. W & L is also undefeated in league play and the game will determine the regular season championship and secure the #1 seed for the state playoffs in Richmond November 3-4. Longwood will put its undefeated record on the line Saturday October 28 at 1pm on the First Avenue field. Also playing yesterday was the Longwood Women's Rugby Club. Unfortunately, the season has been difficult. With no home game and 18 first year players among 25 members, they have yet to get a win and stand at 0-4. Saturday's game against William & Mary was a hard fought loss 22-5. Kristen Harris scored her second try of the season for Longwood's only score. Rookies Kaelynn Hill and Gabrielle Gillis and veteran players Jessica Pavich and Marilyn McKee made outstanding efforts in the loss. The women's last game of the fall is against Radford (away) on Saturday.
SEPTEMBER 16, 2006: LU – 55 LYNCHBURG - 0 Men's and Women's Rugby started their season this past weekend after several weeks of hard practice. The Men's team is loaded with experienced seniors lead by Captain and Club President Justin Mulkey. In a non-league match against Blackwater Rugby Club (out of Lynchburg) the team established themselves by scoring early and often. Eight tries in total were scored by Pat Gorham, Neal Hurst, Brian “Rock” Hancock, Dan Crites, Eddie Johnston and John Clegg. Conversions and penalty kicks by Clegg, Steve Davis and Todd Miller ran the total to 55. Miller was named man-of-the match with 2 tries and three conversion for 16 of the teams points. The men have had an outstanding recruiting season adding 16 new players to the roster for the 2006-2007 season. Last year the team had an outstanding record but fell short in the state championship playoffs. This year the goal is to advance deep into the playoffs to win state and territorial titles.
|