She Who Has the Will to Win

by Kimberly Kroll




















The George Washington Women's Rugby team is almost done with its 2009 fall season.


Wait, GW has a rugby team? Girls play rugby?


Absolutely.

GW's division two club rugby team currently holds for its 2009 fall season a record of five wins, one loss on its A-side (which is comparable to a first string), and two wins, three losses on its B-side.


Of these five wins, two of them count towards deciding the team's position in the Potomac Rugby Union (PRU) Championship November 7th and 8th.

The last obstacle before this championship is GW's third and last league game of the season, against Towson.


There is a history with Towson.


But before the juicy stuff, here's some important background:

The PRU's division 2 college women's teams all played one another for the title of PRU champions in fall of 2008. Every match against a PRU member team counted towards each team's record.


This year, that has changed. The league has been divided in two: there is a BLUE group, which GW is a part of, with St. Mary's, Catholic, and Towson. The RED group consists of Georgetown, Salisbury, American, and UMBC. This year GW's games against only those teams in the BLUE group count towards its PRU championship seed. Last year every game against teams in both groups counted.


Back to Towson. Last fall season, the GW women's team was undefeated. They had won every game, but had one more team to play: Towson.


So as the last week in the PRU season approached, a tangled competition triangle created itself. Georgetown had only lost one game (to GW). Towson had only lost one game (to Georgetown). GW hadn't lost any games, and was set to be the sole winners of the title: PRU champs.

The Towson game made things complicated.


GW drove two and a half hours to play Towson under the lights in a misty rain which lasted the entire match. Some might argue Towson just had a great game that night. Some might argue the referee was unfair. Some might argue that GW just didn't have the best game they could have. Either way you cut it, Towson won by one try, which in rugby is like a touchdown but worth five points. This created a three-way tie between GW, Georgetown, and Towson.


GW lost the league tie-breaker because they had less points overall for the season than both Towson and Georgetown did. GW didn't continue on to compete at the national level.

But they are still PRU champions for Fall 2008.


This year, the Towson game holds a weight of importance in the minds of the GW women ruggers. As they dress up in costumes on Halloween night, they hope to do so with a taste of victory on their lips from their match earlier that day.


GW Rugby has a difficult time playing for fans, partially because not many people know about the team, and also because it is very difficult to get permission to play on the closest rugby pitch to GW's campus: the "Holocaust field", located behind the Holocaust Museum at 15th and Independence, where they were able to schedule a few of their games at the last minute this fall season.


Look out for the GW women's rugby team. They'll be traveling up the East coast in Spring 2010, because spring season is tournament season, but they'll definitely be back next fall to compete against their PRU counterparts, and still have some unfinished business this fall as well.


The GW women's rugby team is my family, by the way. I play fullback. I hope we win that game next Saturday, but if we don't, we'll just get them next time. We always do great things.

"She who has the will to win cannot be beat let's go," we chant before games.


Last spring season, we went on to earn second place of the division two college women's teams at the Beast of the East Tournament in Rhode Island, the largest rugby tournament on the east coast. We also won third place at the Cherry Blossom Tournament held locally in Maryland.