POUGHKEEPSIE, NY (March 31, 2012) -- This game turned into a rout of epic proportions. Even making mass substitutions did nothing to stem the tide. Yale University Women played in the Ivy League last Fall and this is a division I league so the hope was that it would be a very tough game for Vassar. In addition, last spring Vassar played Yale at the Beast of the East Tournament and only just won 17-14. But without a number of starters who were studying abroad, Yale were barely a shadow of that team.

Vassar College Women 102 v 5 Yale University Women
Tries: Margaret Kwateng (2), O'Mara Taylor (2), Meg Slattery (2), Maddie Zappala (1), Gavriella Kaplan (1), Dallas Robinson (3), Natalie Ward (1), Laura Howard (1), Tamasha Persaud (3).
Cons: O'Mara Taylor (3) and Gavriella Kaplan (8).

Next: Saturday April 7, 2012 versus Dartmouth College Women at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) kick-off 2:00 p.m.

A total of 16 tries and 11 conversions set a new school record for points scored by the team in a single game, tries scored by the team in a single game, and conversions made! Vassar had a constant supply of the ball and they put it to good use running amok.  Key starters played just 15 minutes, as it was apparent that this was a mismatch.

This game was of little use for Vassar, as they need to prepare for the USA Rugby National Championship Round of 16 coming up in 3 weeks. There was certainly no real satisfaction in defeating a team by such a margin and no attempt to run the score up. The problem was that the Vassar rookies took their opportunities and 6 tries were scored by first year players, 3 by players in just their second game of rugby! One has to credit the Yale Women who just kept plugging away but what little possession they did get they kicked back to Vassar. Every attempt was made to help Yale given the circumstances but it was declined. The other problem is that in a contact sport you can't ask the players to ease up as they will tend to get injured themselves especially at this level.

The Brewers did manage to get their pattern of attack going and most rewarding was the play of the “B: side players. Yael Schwartz at 9 looked very comfortable running the show and her number 10 Gavy Kaplan is a feisty competitor. Schwartz tackled and distributed well. Meanwhile Sophia Rutkin had some storming runs and first full game player Tamasha Persaud surprised all with her 3 tries. It was also good to see Ana Carias play at number 8 and Emma Elbaum put in a good performance at 13.

But Vassar will need to put this game behind them and work very hard this next week and up to the Championship especially on their defense since they have not had to do that much recently. It was only 2 games ago that Norwich University put 46 points on the Brewers with no reply!

Team: 15 Addie Provenzano 14 O'Mara Taylor 13 Chelsea Boccagno 12 Laura Howard 11 Julia Maltby 10 Hannah Bober 9 Margaret Kwateng 1 Nichelle Jackson 2 Alyssa Bell 3 Rachel Thompson 4 Patty Walton 5 Maddie Zappala 6 Dallas Robinson 7 Meg Slattery 8 Nicole Guererro.

Subs: Sandy Pogarcic for Maddie Zappala, Sophia Rutkin for Patty Walton, Emma Elbaum for Chelsea Boccagno, Gavriella Kaplan for Hannah Bober, Yael Schwartz for Margaret Kwateng, Claire Ashley for Rachel Thompson, Julia McGill for Meg Slattery, Emma Kading for Addie Provenzano, Anna Carias for Nicole Guererro, Tamasha Persaud for Julia Maltby.

Injured/Unavailable: Hannah Fink, Shanaye Williams, Naomi Dann, Emma Redden, Mia Chatterjee, & Zoe Stern.