Sights and sounds of a rugby championship

"Engage!" The sound of helmetless heads crushing against helmetless heads fills the field this beautiful afternoon. The men's rugby team is playing Southern Connecticut State for the Southeastern New England league championship on Sat., Oct. 24. Despite the competition from the football game, more than 100 spectators are watching.

"Hit him hard! Hit him again!" The fans aren't just watching; they're so close to the field that their every sense is engaged. They can hear every time the coach yells instructions to his team (and is ignored); they can smell the sweat, and, in some cases, the blood coating the players. They can practically taste the dirt that the guy on the bottom of the scrum is munching. They can feel the players burst out of bounds and into the crowd, often in a pile of three or more. Sometimes, the game even reaches out and touches someone standing away from the sidelines, like when one player kicks the ball out of bounds, and a nervous fan covers his head and runs--inadvertently almost running into the ball.

"That was idiotic. If he's not going to kick it from there, where does it need to be?" coach Peter Hawkins says. He has just directed one of his players to take a three-point penalty kick rather than try to push the ball further up the field. Yale is up 12-5 against the favored Owls, who, despite their name, have been outwitted by the smaller but faster Blue. For Hawkins, though, a superior mental game isn't enough--he wants a perfect game. So, while most decisions in rugby are made on the fly by the players, Hawkins tries to influence at least one or two, yelling his throat hoarse. He doesn't like that last decision not to kick.

"Yale pride!" a fan yells. Despite the questionable decision not to kick, Yale manages to push the ball in for the five-point try. This score especially evokes pride for Yale because the team really did simply push the ball in--no deceptions, no jukes, no cut-backs. And this against a stronger team, but one that is now wounded.

"Let's get right back in this! Plenty of time left." This was the weak rallying cry managed by a SoCo player after Yale missed a kick, leaving the score at 17-5. This cheer came only after someone on the sidelines exhorted him to get the team fired up.

"Everyone calm down," the ref said. But the comment wasn't directed at a fired-up Owl; he was admonishing Yale's No. 15, David Fischer, BK '99, who had jumped on an Owl who was on his way to being forced out of bounds. This being rugby, the players could not calm down. Soon after, SoCo's No. 2 left the field with a huge bleeding gash in his forehead. The Owls, nonplussed, called for a sub from their B side.

"How long is halftime?" SoCo's No. 2 is bandaged up and wants to get back in the game. And the ref gives him the go-ahead: "Five or six minutes." The fearless Owl responds, "Okay, I'm gonna get this sewn up." Undefeated SoCo thought it would be sewing up its league title in this game, having beaten Central Connecticut, whom Yale tied on Sat., Oct. 17. But Yale came into this game hungry, and is up 22-5.

"Oh no!" the fan yells. Yale is playing polished offense now, keeping control and having their wingers break through when possible. Suddenly, one of the players decides to kick the ball downfield. In rugby, you can only throw the ball laterally or backwards, but you can kick the ball anywhere. Kicking the ball downfield, the player is hoping Yale's speedy wingers can catch up to it and score--clearly a strategy not to the liking of this fan. Hawkins cheers his team: "Burn 'em! Burn 'em!" He repeats almost everything he yells at the team on the field, probably out of habit; they usually don't hear him the first time. Now they listen to him, and burn 'em.

"Okay, I'll explain things as they happen," Andrew Goodwillie, JE '01, says. Goodwillie hails from England and is something of a rugby aficionado, and he is introducing the game to two uninitiated fans. "There's the lineout, they're lifting 'em up. We've caught the ball. We're pushing the ball up the field...but the fly half just made a strange move. Now he's passing the ball, and No. 15 is cutting across the field..." In the middle of Goodwillie's sentence, Fischer jukes, and then cuts his way across SoCo's defense, and, finally, he scores--without question, an amazing individual performance, and a great lesson for the Andrew Goodwillie school of rugby.

"That's a good team out there," coach Hawkins concedes. Indeed, they go on to win by a large margin, 47-10, and advance to the New England Championships--one win away from the regional final.

"Hip, hip, hooray!" the Yale players enthusiastically cheer SoCo after the game, as is traditional. The bewildered, exhausted Owls manage only a tepid, "Hip, hip, hooray."

"Who wants some beer?" a friend of the Yale team yells to both teams as they leave the field. The SoCo players, however, are just too dejected to drink with their conquerors. Looks like Yale will have to finish the keg by themselves.

It's good to be champions.

Photo of Corey Lee, TD '00, (right) by Julia Tiernan.

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