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2004 National Championships
Keystone Women’s Rugby Club shocked the rugby community by beating Boston RFC to take the Northeastern Rugby Union’s third place seed. This qualified them to participate for the first time at the National Championships in Blaine, MN as the 16th seed team on May 26-27, 2004.
Despite bad weather and cancelled flights Keystone managed to make it to MN in time to kick-off their inaugural appearance against top seed Berkeley. In a stellar defensive performance Keystone played one of their best games to date.
The team played like the young energetic team it is. The man out defense was executed by the backline spectacularly and the pack was on the inside to clean up. Despite long periods of time in Berkeley’s half of the field Keystone was unable to touch down in the try zone and the Berkeley backline was just too powerful to hold down.
In spite of losing 42-0, Keystone walked off the field with their heads held high. They had proven that they belonged at the Sweet 16s’. Later KRC would find out that they were the only team at the tournament to hold Berkeley to less than 50 points.
The second match Keystone came in on a high note after the previous day’s performance. This match was an emotionally charged meeting between hometown rival 11th ranked Philadelphia Women’s Rugby Club.
Both teams came out wanting to win badly. Keystone, however, quickly dominated from kick-off. Scrum-half Angie Brambley decimated her other half preventing clean ball to the Philly backline for a great deal of the game. The forwards also had a great game, driving the Philly pack and stealing many of their put-ins.
Keystone’s backline performed extremely well and executed the flat-back line to perfection. Recognizing the space out wide, fly-half Ines Rodriquez spun the ball quickly to allow the wings to score four tries on the outside.
At the final whistle Keystone emerged victorious 45-0 against Philadelphia. The win will improve Keystone’s national standing considerably. The weekend had been a success and Keystone had placed themselves fully in the limelight of USA women’s rugby.
Going into their fall 2005 season Keystone Women’s Rugby Club is ready to buckle down to work to duplicate the success of the 2004 season. Spectacular new recruits are filling in gaps left by vital retiring members and returning veterans are already hard at work on summer training. After an amazing performance at the Saranac Lake tournament where Keystone beat NRU rivals Boston and Beantown the 2005 season is set to be even more successful than the last.
article contributed by Alyson Fick