To all,

The Towson University men’s rugby team won the inaugural Battle of Baltimore pitting UMBC, Johns Hopkins, Loyola, and Towson against one another. This tournament was sponsored by our good friends at Baltimore/Chesapeake RFC.

In our first game we played arch rival UMBC.  We totally dominated all phases of the game and I don’t think they even got inside our 22 meter line.  We scored a couple of tries and walked away with a 14 – 0 win. Considering that the halves were only 20 minutes long and the field was very sloppy, we were happy with the end result.

In the championship game we played Loyola.  Loyola has a fine program and at one point was ranked in the top 10 in the country last fall. We were expecting a very tough game and the boys were ready to play.  We went out and totally dismantled Loyola and won by a final score of 29 – 0.  Here is the note I sent to the boys this morning:

To all,

Great weekend of rugby!!

For the first time this season we had all of our players on the field at the same time and it made a huge difference.  We steamrolled two quality opponents and played some of the best rugby I have seen in the last two years.  We won every phase of the game. Your rucking and support were inspiring! The forwards won everything in sight.  They ran around and through our opponent.  We blew them off of the ball.  The backs attacked the center of the field and this set up several long runs around the wings.  It was truly beautiful.

Now lets keep it up.  We need to take what we did this weekend and put it into a bottle and drink from it before every game.  There have been a couple of occasions when our forwards have caught fire like this.  Think St. Mary’s two years ago.  Think Georgetown in the PRU semifinals.  And this weekend.  Combine the fitness work that we have been doing for 3 months, improving skills and fundamentals, practicing out doors, and six coaches working to bring it all together and we have the opportunity to win the MARFU’s and advance to the nationals.  Nobody is going to give us anything and most of them are working just as hard as we are.

We have two weeks left on Unitas Stadium.  4 practices.  We need 100% attendance.  I am thrilled by the prospects of our forwards getting to work with Matt, Tony, and Jeff.  There is so much that they can teach you.  Plus, they bring a certain toughness to our forwards that was evident on Saturday.  You bullied our opponents.  Paul, Jeremy, and I will work with the backs who I thought had a great weekend.  There is a lot of competition at many of our positions.  We have players that are banged up.  We need to build our depth.  We have two new centers in our back line.  Who knows what position might be next.  I have every confidence in the world in the players who are moving up.  Don’t get discouraged if you are not starting.  Work harder, have a positive mental attitude, and be ready when your name is called.  This is the way it is suppose to be with a good program.

I want to thank our B side for the great job they did of playing one of the best old men’s clubs on the east coast.  We have new guys everywhere and yet we competed in all phases of the game and had some wonderful back line movements.  Our forwards stood up their guys and really played hard.  I want to apologize for only getting to play one half of rugby. Our opponent decided that they had had enough of Towson rugby and didn’t want to take another beat down at our hands. They opted to play Hopkins A side instead of our strong B side.  We won’t forget this and will get our chance to give them the punishment that they deserve.

We travel to Navy this weekend and everybody will get a chance to play.

See you at practice tonight.

Coach

To all,

The Towson University men’s rugby team wrapped up sole possession of first place in the Potomac Rugby Union with it’s victory over local rival, Johns Hopkins, this weekend.  With our good friends down Charles street, Loyola University, upsetting previously unbeaten Georgetown, we secured first place with our undefeated regular season.  This is the first time in decades that Towson has won the PRU and it is our hope that this will not be the last.

Towson played Hopkins at Bocek field in downtown Baltimore under a glorious blue sky on Saturday.  The team knew that a win over JH would give us a first round bye.  With all that was on the line, the boys were still overconfident and it showed as they started slowly.  There was very little fire in the boys stomach and we let Hopkins hang around for most of the first half.  We made poor passes, dropped balls, tackled poorly, and in general, were listless in our efforts.  The coaches warned the team in advance that this could/would happen if we didn’t take this team seriously.  With about twenty minutes left in the half we finally woke up and started to play rugby.  We had several good back movements and eventually one of our backs broke through their backline, got tackled near the goal line, and made a beautiful offload from the ground to a supporting player.  We work on offloading every practice and did a good job throughout the game of not dying with the ball.  The kick was good and we jumped ahead 7 – 0.  We had a couple of good movements in the waning minutes of the first half and scored two more tries.  Our flyhalf was deadly on his conversions and we were ahead 21 – 3 at the half.

Rather than fussing at the lads about their play, we encouraged them to get back to the basics of Towson rugby.  We have always stressed good passing, good rucking, and good tackling.  We knew we could do better and the boys entered the second half with a renewed sense of purpose.

We came to life the last forty minutes of the game and beat Hopkins in every phase of play.  The forwards had a dozen good ball movements and set up many of our tries.  The backs played unselfishly and created a large number of overloads against a helpless Hopkins back line.  Our fly half converted eight of nine kicks and we scored 40 points in the second half.  Final score: 61 – 3.

The B side was up next, and as they have done for the last three seasons, shut out their opponent by the final score of 31 – 0.  The victories that the Beavers post each week are important because of the depth it provides this team.  Many of our first fifteen players were on the B side last year and are now helping us at the next level.  We continue to groom the players of tomorrow and this has been vital in dealing with injuries.  Most of our competitors have very little depth beyond their first fifteen.  As their players get injured and beat up, they don’t have the depth to bring in players from their B sides with out losing some of their effectiveness.  On the other hand, we have complete faith in our B side players and many of them have filled in when some of our A side players get injured.  While much of the focus is on the outcome of the A side matches, it has been the Beavers and the Cougars who have been the strength of this club.  Three cheers for them!!!

We end the regular season with a 5 – 0 record in league play.  We out scored our opponents by a combined score of 222 – 9.  We did not allow a single try and surrendered only 3 penalty kicks.  We beat the #4 team in the nation along the way.  We earned the number one seed in the upcoming tournament.  We are currently ranked #8 in the country and expect to move up in the rankings.  Our B side lost only one game all season. This was to a squad made up of alumni players.  Not including that loss, our B side has not lost to another college B side in three seasons. There is no drop off when we bring in our C side, as they have played a part in every victory the B side has had this year.  We end the season with a roster of over 50 players.

We have a bye this week and then will play in the semi-finals in two weeks.  We will play the winner of the Georgetown/Navy game.  These games will be held at Severn Rivers home field in Severna Park.  As well as we have done in the regular season, it is the tournament that will determine if we are invited to the MARFU(Mid Atlantic Rugby Football Union)playoffs.  We have to win at least one of our two games to move on to this tournament.  The bye week will give us a good chance to heal our injuries and get ready for the playoffs.

Thanks to all of the players, coaches, alumni, parents, and club sports for their support of our team.

Go Towson!!
Don

To all,

The Towson University men’s team defeated the #4 ranked team in the country, Salisbury University, by final score of 8 – 3 this past Saturday.  In front of an estimated crowd of close to 500 fans, the boys from TU waged a war of epic proportions, to take down a team that has been one of the best programs in the country for the last decade.  On a beautiful day, in front of the student union, the stage was set for one of the biggest games in recent memory.

As game time approached, the two teams started to warm up in preparation for the contest.  The captain of the Salisbury team was screaming at his team that they were going to kick our tales, that we weren’t in their league, that they are the best team in the PRU.  This was yelled at the top of his lungs for all to hear.  Our boys on the other hand kept their mouths shut and went about the business at hand.  We were the quiet team.  Don’t kid your self, we didn’t much care for the lack of respect that our opponent was showing us on our home field.  We were going to let our play do our talking.

The game started tentatively for both sides as the two teams were feeling each other out.  There was a lot of kicking and neither team was really taking charge of the match.  Given the stakes, neither team wanted to make a mistake and both sides played conservatively.  About half way through the first half, Salisbury was awarded a penalty kick and scored the first points of the game.  Salisbury 3 – Towson 0.  This seemed to energize our team and we started to assert ourselves. Momentum swung our way and we started to play on their side of the field.  Eventually we were awarded a penalty kick and our fly half kicked a thirty yard kick to tie the score up at 3 – 3.  The stellar defense being played by both sides was limiting the scoring opportunities and neither side had any real chance to cross the try line.  At the half : Towson 3 – Salisbury 3.

In the second half the boys from Towson finally started to execute our game plan and we kept the ball in their half of the field.  We did an excellent job in the lineouts and scrums and started to get clean ball to our backs.  We had several nice breaks by the backs but couldn’t quite finish.  We were always one pass away from breaking the game open.  With about fifteen minutes remaining in the game Towson had the ball inside of our opponents twenty two meter line. Our forwards started to play small ball and attacked their goal line on four successive plays.  After drawing in our opponents backs, we finally spun the ball to our backs.  They quickly moved it down the line and our wing dove across the try line to give Towson the lead.  The kick failed and we were up by the score of 8 – 3.  We now went about the business of holding on to the lead and our opponent turned up the pressure.  Time and time again they would try to run around us or through us. Our defense, which had yet to give up a try this year, held tough for the rest of the half.  The final whistle blew and we celebrated one of the biggest victories in recent memory.

Our B side was up next and we took on a mixed squad of alumni and second team players from Salisbury.  We have the fortunate problem of having a very large roster.  We had over 50 players take part in this weekends games.  We lost for the first time in recent memory and fell by the score of 29 – 15. Since many of the players were alumni and in their mid twenties, we take this loss in stride confident that if they had put out a true college side, we would have won handily. We subbed our entire first side out at the half and bought in fifteen new players.

We close out the season with a game against local rival Johns Hopkins (Tentatively) on Burdick field this Saturday.  We have an excellent chance of holding on to our top seed in the PRU and entering the tournament with a bye week. We will not be overlooking anybody!

Thanks for all of the support that the alumni, parents, and friends showed for our team this weekend.  It makes a real difference and we appreciate you being there for us.

See you on Saturday!!
Don

To all,

The Towson University men’s rugby team traveled to the Washington DC area and laid a whooping on a good George Washington University team. Based upon some close scores against good teams from our conference, wewere worried that this might be a trap game, and made sure that the boys weren’t looking forward to next weeks showdown against Salisbury.  We came out strong and scored twice in the first seven minutes of the game. This seemed to take the wind out of GW’s sails and we rolled to a final score of 70 – 0.  We dominated the game in every phase and the coaches were very pleased with the maturity and focus that the team showed.  The score at the half was 43 – 0.  As the game wore on, we made a few substitutions to rest some of our injured and beat up players.  This also presented an excellent opportunity for some of the B side players to get some experience at the next level.  We added several more tries and our first drop kick of the season to close out the scoring in the second half.

The Beavers were up next and they continued their unbeaten streak against other college B sides that now stretches to over 3 seasons.  We continue to have huge depth in the backs with many of our C side players being good enough to start for some of the teams in our league.  We don’t quite have the depth in the pack that we would like and continue to recruit bigger and stronger players.  GW put up a good fight and we were only leading 15 – 0 at the half.  We substituted liberally in the second half and added another 13 points.  Several players scored their first tries of the season.  We have been very pleased at the lack of a drop-off when we bring in our third side to play against our opponents second side. Our overall depth has been fantastic and it is one of the reasons that we have had such a strong resurgence over the last two seasons. Final score, 28 – 0.

We now enter the home stretch of the schedule and are currently in first place in the Potomac Rugby Union.  While both Salisbury and Georgetown remain undefeated, we are currently the top seed due to our large point differential against league opponents.  We have outscored our opponents in A side games by a margin of 153 – 3.  We are 4 -1 against college teams with our only loss being a close one to division one, University of Maryland.  Fortunately, this game does not count in the PRU standings.  We expect to enter the national rankings soon and have been in touch with Rugby Magazine to let them know of our success.

We play perennial power Salisbury University this week at the Burdick field in front of the student union.  Salisbury has been the class of our league for most of the last decade and the time has come for Towson to step up and make a name for ourselves.  Salisbury is currently ranked #4 in the country.  We expect this game to be nothing less than world war three and we would love to get the biggest turnout ever to support our lads in this contest.  Whatever the outcome, I promise that we will give nothing less than our best effort.  Please come out and shout at the top of your lungs.

If you have not visited our web site, please take a few minutes to check it out.  All of the information with regards to our upcoming schedule is on the web site.  The address is Towsonrugby.org.  See you all on Saturday.

Don
Class of 82
Go Tigers!!!

To all,

The Towson men’s rugby club hosted local rival UMBC and posted one of our biggest victories in years.  We lost to UMBC last year on the last play of the game 16-15 and have been waiting to exact some revenge since then.  This game has been circled on the calendar since the fall schedules were released back in August.

This was a great week for Towson rugby.  As we continue to raise our profile, the school is starting to take notice.  We were allowed to practice on the turf field at Unitas Stadium on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings for over three hours each night.  Playing under the lights is a lot of fun and we had some very productive practices.  On Thursday evening our C side, The Cougars, traveled down Charles street to take on Loyola’s B side.  We traveled with about 22 players, most of whom have played less than 10 games.  Our squad was made up exclusively of C and D side players, as we wanted to rest our B side for the game on Saturday. This was a great opportunity for these new players to get 80 minutes and show what they are capable of doing.  We played on the brand new rugby pitch at Loyola.  It is huge!!  We won all phases of the game and walked away with a 45 – 6 victory.

After setting up Burdick field on Friday evening, the team leaders hosted a pasta dinner for all of the players.  This is a great way to build our camaraderie and chemistry.  Little events like this can have a big impact on team unity.

Saturday turned out to be perfect in many ways.  Playing at home.  Great weather.  Large fan turnout.

The First Fifteen kicked the day off and dominated the game from the first whistle.  We were ready for this game and the boys were as fired up as I have seen them.  As we have the last few weeks, our forwards dominated in both the set play and in the loose.  We continually rucked over our opponent, winning both our rucks and a lot of theirs.  We won all of our scrums and pushed them off of there’s.  We have the best jumpers in the league and won all of our lineouts and most of theirs. As some point they just gave up in the lineouts.  After keeping the ball in our opponents half of the field for much of the first ten minutes we finally broke through when our all conference prop ran through a half dozen arm tackles and dove across the try line.  The kick was good and TU was up 7 – 0.  A few minutes later Towson was awarded a penalty inside the ten yard line.  After touching the ball through the mark our scrum half handed the ball off to our beastly prop who scored his second try in less than five minutes.  Kick was good.  TU increased its lead to 14 – 0.  Late in the first half UMBC had trouble handling a loose ball. Our wing dribbled the ball five yards, kicked it again, stayed with it and the ball popped up into his arms as he dove across the try line. Kick was made and we went into the half leading 21 – 0.

It was now time for the backs to get involved and make a statement.  We started to get clean ball and our backs did a good job of getting the ball wide for several long runs.  Both of our wings scored during the second half as we overwhelmed their backs with good passing and great running.  It is a thing of beauty to watch a good back line turn the corner and run down the sideline.  Our fly half scored the final try off of some good second phase rugby when the wings bought the ball back inside and hooked up with the our centers.  One final pass lead to the last score of the day and we walked off the field with a tremendous victory.  Final score – Towson 40 – UMBC 3.  This was a great win against a good team.  It wasn’t that UMBC played poorly, it was that Towson played well.

The Beavers ended the day with a pasting of UMBC’s second side, 72 – 0. We have some really good talent on the second side and many of these players are making a case to get some A side time.  One of our wings scored 5 tries.  He is brand new and has only played in 4 games so far. Our forwards did a great job of winning a lot of clean ball and the backs did their thing when the ball got out to them.  Total score for the 3 games this weekend was Towson 157 – our opponents 9.

I would like to take a moment and recognize the contribution that the coaching staff is making to this program.  We have a total of 5 coaches and the instruction that these players are getting is phenomenal.  Three cheers for the following coaches:

Paul Redding – has been with me since the beginning.  He does a great job on game day and much of the success of the B side is due to Paul. He does a good job of staying positive and is my personal dose of Prozac when I get to wound up.  The players really like Paul.

Jeremy Gorney – Jeremy is a recent grad and is in charge of conditioning.  He is one of the most mature 24 years olds that I have ever met and is a link to many of the current players.  He is an old school rugby player and brings a certain level of toughness to the coaching squad.

Jeff Adamzyck – Jeff is the head coach of the girls team and has also has volunteered to help coach our forwards.  With out a doubt, he has had a huge impact on the forwards and their recent success.  His technical knowledge of rugby is unsurpassed.  He taking our very talented forwards to the next level.

Tony DeCesare – Tony answered the call when I asked the alumni to come help with our forwards.  A TU alumni with over 2 decades of experience,and  he is the perfect compliment to Jeff and together they have done a great job of teaching our forwards.

Thanks to all of our coaches for their time, energy, and dedications. It shows on Saturday.

We head back down to Washington this weekend to play George Washington University.  We play on the same field we played on last week.  It is always fun playing on The Mall and we look forward to getting back onto the pitch.

Coach Don

To all,

The Towson Men’s rugby team got back on track this past weekend with a resounding 43 – 0 drubbing of Catholic University. This is the team’s largest margin of victory against a league opponent in several years. We traveled to play on the Mall in Washington DC, in the shadow of the Washington Monument. Of course there were several protests going on and it took our players over an hour to park once we got to the field. Almost all of our players arrived within 20 minutes of kickoff and the coaches were concerned about their mental readiness. As the game started it was clear that TU was going to start slow and it took awhile for us to pick up our pace. We finally broke through on a kick and chase down inside of their own twenty two meter. A few minutes later our forwards broke through to increase the lead to 10 – 0. We missed both kicks and went into the half leading 10-0.

We were doing an excellent job of blowing up their rucks and the Catholic backs rarely got clean ball. We entered the second half with a renewed sense of purpose and the boys came out on fire. We dominated all phases of the game and rolled to a 43-0 victory. Our backs finally got on track and we were able to take the ball wide for our initial breaks. For the first time this season we had second and third phase movements off of these runs. Many of our tries were scored off of multiple phase movements of fifty yards or longer.

Unfortunately our B and C side did not have the same enjoyment that the first fifteen had. We expected to play a full B side game knowing that we would have to switch our entire side at the half to bring in our C side players. We were informed that another game was scheduled after our B game and that we would only be able to run to fifteen minute periods. We are a victim of our own success. Most of the teams we play can barley field a B side, much less a C side and this means that many of our players only get to play half a game each weekend. We do everything possible to make sure that everybody plays, but it stinks that we have to limit the minutes that many of our players get. We are now in the process of scheduling games for the Cougars during the week. We play Loyola colleges B and C side on Thursday night under the lights at Loyola. This will give our brand new guys a chance to play a full game and allow us to let our B side play the whole game on Saturday. We have also schedule a game against Navy’s new guys to do the same thing. Thank you Mike Flanagan! In a shortened game our B and C side combined to win by the final margin of 26-0.

Next up for the boys is a game against our arch rival – UMBC. They are coached by former Towson coach Rusty Cross and this has turned into a bit of a war. Rusty is a very good coach and I am sure that we will have our hands full this weekend. The game is being played at Towson and we would encourage you all to come out and give us your support.

More details to follow.

Go Towson

Stoney
Class of 1982

To all,

The Towson rugby team lost a well played, close game by the final score of 22 – 14. We played division one, The University of Maryland, under the lights on Saturday night in front of a large crowd of several hundred people. The Terps are in limbo as far as their league schedule this year as they await the formation of the new Atlantic Coast Conference(ACC). As such they are dropping down from their normal division one schedule to play all of the teams in the PRU division two this year. Their inclusion in the ACC should really help bolster the size and strength of their club going forward. Their roster currently has over 100 players on it and with the addition of a nationally renowned coach, they are going to take their game to a new level.

As with last years Towson victory, this game was a back and forth affair and remained very close until the Terps put the game away in the final minutes. Towson started strong and our pack played its best game of the year. We had struggled with our rucking games against very strong packs from Rocky Gorge and WVU. We worked hard on this in practice and we were thrilled with the improvement that has taken place since the beginning of the season. Time and time again our boys would blow up their rucks and this resulted in a number of turnovers for our side. We finally used our momentum to score a try to take a 7 – 0 lead. A few minutes later Maryland responded with a try off of an overload and closed the score to 7 – 5. The Terps did a great job of counter attacking off of our kicks. They had two foreign born players at fullback and flyhalf. Every time we kicked the ball their fullback would catch the ball, make a good decision, and attack the point in the field where we were missing. In a back and forth game, we regained momentum and eventually scored a try when our wing forward picked up a lose ball and dove across the try line to give us a 14 – 5 lead. The Terps came right back at us and scored a try wide on the wing to close the score to 14 – 10 at the half.

The second half played out much like the first half and neither team could score for the first twenty minutes. Eventually Maryland scored off of a counter attack with their terrific fullback setting up a long run down the sidelines to give the Terps its first lead of the match 17 – 14. We raised our intensity and had several opportunities to regain the lead only to be stymied by a poor pass or dropped pass. Several times we had game winning opportunities only to have a player drop the ball. We constantly stress to the boys the need to finish these chances because you only get a couple of them each game. Down by only three points we fought valiantly for the remainder of the game until the Terps scored in the last two minutes of the game to put the win out of reach. Final score 22 – 14 in a really welled played game by both sides.

Like a broken record, the B side lifted our spirits with another victory. In the handful of losses that this team has experienced over the last two years, the Beavers always get us back on track and this weekend was no different. In a tough defensive match, the boys from Towson prevailed with a 10 – 7 victory. Our iron curtain defense held the Terps to only a single try. Our opponent was just as stingy and we were able to score only one try off a very long run by one of our very talented new players. We have a number of players on the B side that are making a strong case to move up to the first fifteen.

The C side finished up the evening with a closely fought victory for the Tigers of Towson, 10 – 5. While composed primarily of new players, our boys played against a motley collection of A,B, and C players from Maryland. To our opponents credit, they fielded a team so that we could get the Cougars a game and we owe a debt of gratitude to many of their players who had already played a game.

We now enter our league season with our next game against Catholic University. Given the strength of our schedule so far, we should be ready. While disappointed with the loss this weekend, we chose to play this schedule in order to raise our game for the league season. As I look at our opponents early season schedule, nobody had played a tougher list of teams than us. We are very pleased with the progress the team has made and have every confidence that we are ready to kick some ***.

On a sad note, one of our former players died this past week from a drug related overdose. Abe Cahan, a junior at TU, joined our team last spring and was a well liked member of our terrific B side. Abe was a genius who was majoring in physics and philosophy. The team made a strong showing at his funeral yesterday and his parents really appreciated the love and loyalty that we showed to a fallen teammate. As you know, men at this age feel as if they are indestructible. It is a sad lesson that substance abuse can take even the strongest person. We hope that his teammates and the entire student body can learn a lesson from this tragic ending. We have dedicated the rest of the season to Abe’s memory and I am sure that he will not be far from our thoughts.
God bless you Abe.

Don

To all,

The Towson University Men’s rugby team traveled to Howard county to play the Rocky Gorge RFC.  Stepping up against a good, older, and stronger men’s team can make for a long day and the team fell hard by the score of 30 – 7.  We were pretty much beat in every phase of the game.  We traveled with a watered down A side in an effort to rest our injured players for the upcoming league season.  Four of our starters, including our scrum half, flyhalf, and fullback all were on the sidelines in civilian attire.  This meant we had to juggle our other starters to fill in for these players.  When all was said and done, we had different players at 9 positions then we had for last weeks victory over WVU. Continuity among backs and forwards is crucial to the success of any good team and we had very little of it.

From the start of the game, Rocky Gorge used their bigger and stronger pack to small ball our forwards into submission.  They are a well schooled team with excellent discipline.  As the game wore on it became clear to our forwards that we weren’t going to win many rucks and this led to our conceding the ball at the majority of the breakdowns. Whereas they would commit 3 or 4 players to the rucks, we would usually counter with 1 or 2 guys.  We would then line up 6 guys to play defense against their attacking forwards.  Just like last week, our boys would take them on time and time again and did a decent job of slowing down their attack.  Unlike last week, RG had excellent backs and when the ball made its way to their back line they ran right through our backs like a hot knife through butter. The centers on the other team were big, strong, and fast.  They ran very hard and our arm tackles were not effective in stopping their forward progress.  After a long first half the score was 17 – 0 in favor of our opponent.  At the half we encouraged the boys to pick up their intensity.  We made a few adjustments, changed a couple of players, and trotted onto the field with determination to play better than we did in the first half.

During the second half of the game the boys started to get their sea legs and we played much better.  We started to win some of our rucks and were then able to play TU ball and get the rock to our wings.  We had several long runs and finally scored a try early in the second half. Rocky Gorge continued to control possession of the ball, but we started to believe in our selves again and played much more aggressively.  We still couldn’t contain their backs and they scored a couple of more times for a final score of 30 – 7.

While we knew we would be in for a tough match when we put RG on the schedule, there are still some positives things that we can take from this loss. Our lads got an opportunity to see what it takes to compete at the next level.  We rose to the challenge in the second half and played a lot better.  Playing against a pack of this caliber should help us compete when we get into our league season.  Many of our league opponents are scheduling soft teams to get ready for league play.  We have done the opposite and hope that the strong teams we are playing will make us hard as steel.

As has been the case for the last 2 seasons, our B side saved the day with a hard fought 12 – 5 victory against an experienced side.  We put a squad on the field that was comprised of mostly new players who had only played once or twice.  Half the team was playing it first game ever. This was a classic battle of young versus old, experience versus new guys.  We played the game with the scrums being uncontested because we didn’t want either team to sustain an injury in the set play due to the number of brand new guys we had in the front row.  This clearly benefited TU at the expense of our more experienced opponent.  To their credit, they never complained and were a fine group of gentlemen.  As can only happen in the game of rugby, their players were helping to coach our new players in the scrum.  Our hats are off to these guys.  In the end, our new guys in the backs were better than their new guys in the backs and we salvaged the day with a good victory.

We now head back to the practice field to get ready for our next opponent, division one team, the University of Maryland.  We have a bye week coming up and will use this time to lick our wounds, get healthy, and work on our game. We play the Terps on September 25, under the lights, on the Union field at Towson.  Should be a great time.

We continue to attract new players and currently have a roster of over 60 players.  Half of these guys are brand new and we are doing our best to set the hook on them and turn them into lifetime ruggers.  In spite of this weekend, the team continues to grow and prosper.  Thank you all for your support and we will see you on the pitch soon.

Go Towson!
Coach Stone

To all,

The Towson University rugby team traveled to West Virginia University this past weekend and were able to avenge one of our two losses from last spring. We traveled to Morgantown on Friday evening in 3 vans supplied by the school. We spent the night in a nice hotel paid for by club sports. The team gathered in the morning for an all you can eat buffet, courtesy of the coaches. We then traveled to the pitch to get ready for our game.

WVU is a very good program and we scheduled them in the hopes of getting a good test match to prepare us for our league season. The Mountaineers regularly compete for their league title and have advanced to the national playoffs on several occasions. They are a big, strong, well coached team and we knew that we would have to be on top of our game if we were to prevail.

The game started in a back and forth fashion. Neither team was able to make much headway and the score was 0-0 for the first twenty minutes. WVU is a forwards based team and they rucked like there is no tomorrow. They were able to control almost 80% of their rucks throughout the game and their intensity was huge. We countered this with a very strong tackling game from our forwards. Time and time again the opposition would try a pick and go or would try to small ball our forwards. Our boys would meet them and stop them cold. At some point they had to get discouraged because they were controlling possession of the ball and yet were getting stifled at every turn. This was a good day to be a man in the pack. Our backs played a strategic game and would kick inside their half of the field. We controlled 80% of the lineout’s, including most of theirs. Our first score came off a breakaway by our all conference prop who off loaded to one of our second rows who broke a couple of tackles for our first score. The conversion was good. Towson 7 – 0. WVU roared back and had us on our heals for the last 10 minutes of the half. We did a poor job of getting out of our end of the field and after a turnover, WVU was able to score a try off of a ruck. They missed the conversion. Half time score TU 7 – WVU 5.

At the half, we stressed playing our style of game and that we would have to do a better job of blowing up their rucks. We needed to get the ball to our backs and give them a chance to turn the corner. We started the half strongly and momentum swung our way for the rest of the game. We did a good job in the set scrums and lineouts and finally started to win some of our own rucks. The backs attacked their back line and we had multiple opportunities to score on the wing.  Several times we had a 2 on 1, only to have our player die with the ball. This is something that we are going to have to work on. You only get a few opportunities each game to score a try and you have to take advantage of them. Our first try of the second half occurred when our scrum half did a pop kick over both sets of forwards deep in WVU’s territory. He sprinted after the ball and the ball bounced right up to him. He went untouched for the last 10 yards. We missed the conversion. Score 12 – 5 in favor of TU. We continued to keep WVU deep in their own half and scored our second try when our wing touched the ball through quickly off a penalty. He caught them napping and was able to off load to our scrum half in support at about the 10 yard line. He dodged one or two players and dotted the ball for another try. The conversion was good. Score 19 – 5. We continued to dominate the rest of the game. WVU scored an inconsequential try on the last play of the game to make the final score 19 – 12. This was a very good win against a very strong opponent.

The B side game followed and TU won by the final score of 17-0. We had half a dozen guys play in their first game ever and they did an outstanding job. We have a rule that we tell the new guys to follow – whey you have the ball – RUN – and when they have the ball – TACKLE. Many of these boys had been to a total of 3 or 4 practices and were then thrown into the lions den. They rose to the occasion and we were very proud of their effort. Our B side has not lost to another B side in over 2 full seasons and the future of the club looks bright as long as we continue to bring these guys along.

WVU did a great job of hosting us and the day continued with pizza and beverages. Throw in a few rugby songs and the afternoon was complete. We then piled into the vans for the long ride home. The ride was made easier by the huge victory and the camaraderie that only the game of rugby can produce.

We are back to work this week as we prepare for Rocky Gorge of Howard county. This is a good men’s team and we will have to be at our best if we hope to compete. If you can make it to the game, stop by and say hello.

Go Towson!!!
Coach Stone

To all,

As the summer is winding down, the Towson University rugby team is getting ready for our upcoming fall season. Coming off a 13 – 2 spring, and returning 12 of our 15 starters, we have high hopes for winning the PRU and advancing to the national playoffs in the spring. Many of our players have spent the summer playing 7’s in places like Las Vegas, Florida, and Connecticut. The team has been working hard over the summer as we prepare for a very difficult fall schedule.

In an effort to get ready for our tough league schedule, we have taken on the challenge of playing several division one programs. Before the season gets under way we will have played West Virginia University,
University of Maryland and local men’s team Rocky Gorge. As we get into the heart of our schedule we will have to go through local rivals UMBC and Salisbury. This is the toughest schedule in the league by far. On
the other hand, if we are as good as we think we are, then playing good teams has got to be part of the equation.

We will be getting a formal schedule out to you soon so that you can mark your calendars for our home games. We had crowds of over 300 people at our home games last year and hope to increase our fan support for the coming season. Hopefully the alumni weekend got your blood flowing and jogged your memory about what a great sport rugby is.

Finally, we are looking for an experienced forwards coach who can make practice twice a week at 5:00. All of our current coaches are former backs and we would really like to get someone with some experience in
the pack to take our very talented forwards to the next level. While this does require a certain time commitment to the club, I can say with confidence, that all of our current coaches are having a blast working
with this group of young men. Let me know if you have an interest in this position.

To win the game is great
To play the game is greater
To love to play the game is the greatest.

Best regards,
Don Stone