POUGHKEEPSIE, N.Y. - Right on the heels of their victory over Bowdoin College in Maine yesterday, the Vassar College Women's Rugby went across town to take on Marist College in a Tri-State Conference quarterfinal game. The Brewers took home a 76-19 victory over the Red Foxes and advance to the Tri-State Conference Semifinal on Saturday at the Vassar Farm. Senior Caeli Porette (Stony Point, NY) recorded four tries in the victory for Vassar.

Vassar College Women 76 v 19 Marist College Women
Tries: Asia Baker (2), Caeli Porette (4), Sophia Bailey (3), Yasmeen Kassem-Scott (2), Katie Canavan (1).
Cons: Zoe Lynch (8)

The Vassar players came out strong early and dominated the first 10 minutes of play. Asia Baker finished off Vassar's first sortie into the Marist 22 with Zoe Lynch converting the try and before anyone had blinked it was 7-0. Lynch was to have a banner day from the kicking tee connecting on 8 of 12 for a tally of 16 points.

But Marist rallied after the initial surge and put in some thumping tackles to thwart the Vassar attack. Then the Red Foxes scooted through and evened up the game at 7-7.

Vassar's outside center Caeli Porette went over after some good continuity from the Vassar team and it seemed like the butterflies were dispersing. Then Baker went over again and at 19-7, Marist struck back and scored a try when Porette went looking for an interception only to see the heels of the Marist center as she whizzed past to cut the advantage to 19-12 and it was game on again.

Vassar rounded out the half with two tries, one from Sophia Bailey and the other from Yasmeen Kassem-Scott and looked in a strong position at 31-12. But there had been some solid contact and tackles from Marist that had ruffled the Vassar feathers.

The second half saw much more commitment from all the players and multiple phases of play were put together. There were fewer handling errors and less penalties and now Vassar was getting some real flow into the game. The Marist players were constantly back peddling and scrambling to defend as Vassar ball carriers pushed forward.

Sophia Bailey was a real spark plug running the show and is maturing into the scrumhalf position. Bailey had some impressive runs and although clobbered a few times bounced back and played on. The backs led by Kasey Drake made inroads regularly and Lauren Showalter found running seams and got Vassar on the front foot countless times. Claire Dwyer had probably a best game of the season thus far and Isabel Rodriguez never failed to give 100% regularly getting over the gain line.

Lock Grace Skakel was rock solid and their partner in crime Louise Ambler stoll lineout ball almost at will. The bench players all added energy and did well. Yael Tuckman carried strongly, almost scoring her first try. Katie Canavan scored a try and ran hard as did center Bella Robinson.

Team: 15 Claire Zickl 14 Zoe Lynch 13 Caeli Porette 12 Isabel Rodriguez 11 Elise Johnson 10 Kasey Drake 9 Sophia Bailey 1 Julie Geller 2 Claire Dwyer 3 Andie Authers 4 Grace Skakel 5 Louise Ambler 6 Asia Baker 7 Yasmeen Kassem-Scott 8 Lauren Showalter. Subs: Katie Canavan for Claire Dwyer, Julia Wolff for Asia Baker, Yael Tuckman for Andie Authers, Sylvia Martinez for Yasmeen Kassem-Scott, Bella Robinson for Sophia Bailey.