You've probably seen them practicing, the girls in muddied blue and white striped shirts, tossing around something like a football. You may even have some ideas about what women's rugby players are about, from stories around drinking or even leg breaking. What you likely don't realize, though, is that the women's club rugby team is in the midst a nine-game unbeaten streak, and it recently captured the Division II East championship.
In the past four years, the team has transformed from a haphazard collection of players which could not score a single point into an organized unit that practices at a near-varsity level and has outscored opponents 78-23 for a 5-0-1 record this year. Perhaps the highlight of the season included a 5-0 blanking of defending Division II champions Wellesley on Sept. 29.
"We did not score a single try two years ago and now we are going to the playoffs," senior Tory Foster said. "We are an old fashioned, underdog, Bad News Bears kind of team."
The team is led by senior co-captains Jenny Albertini and Julie Litzenberger, as well as coach Kara Yimoyines, a '98 Tufts grad and former rugby captain. Yimoyines currently participates in the Boston Women's Rugby Club, and has brought in a group of four assistant coaches to help guide the team.
"We have had a lot of problems with the administration over the years, and [Yimoyines] has been there and knows the history and helped us work through it and gain trust from the administration," Albertini said.
Aside from the two captains, the team features 11 other seniors, many with a few years of experience under their belts. The seniors all agree that the turning point for the club came in a pivotal game last October when they defeated Northeastern, giving the team its first victory of the season.
"That one win changed our mental game completely," senior Emily Schaffer said. "Before that win, we played much more of a defense game. After that, we went in to games trying to win, not just to survive."
The club won its final three games of the 2000 season and has had little trouble this year, defeating rivals Wellesley and the University of Rhode Island (URI), as well as three other schools. Last weekend, the 28-12 victory against URI clinched the Division II East title for the club, and it will travel to Stonehill College tomorrow morning to take part in the New England Rugby Union (NERU) Championship. The tournament will feature four teams from the area, including Norwich (North), Southern Connecticut (South), and Springfield who won the wild card.
The current Tufts squad has not played any of these clubs, but from the scouting reports it seems it'll be in for a challenging day.
"From what we've heard, Norwich has scored over 300 points this season and not given up a single try," Foster said.
Regardless, the team is happy to have qualified for the tournament. "The other teams must be good, but we are confident in our abilities," Albertini said. "We're so happy that we have gotten to this point, and anything beyond that would be incredible."
If the team wins its first game against Norwich, it will automatically qualify for the Northeastern Championships, which will be held the following weekend at UMass-Amherst. The top two teams from that tournament will then participate in the National Championships in April and May.
The rugby team's success this season can be attributed to a number of factors, but most team members agree that an increased level of commitment has made the difference. While players are told that they are only required to attend three practices a week, most team members attend all five.
"It really shows dedication," Albertini said. "I have worked harder for this team than any varsity sport I played in high school."
After the team qualified for the postseason on Saturday, the practices of the past week intensified even more, as the club hopes to ride its underdog role to some more victories.
"We went into practice after we knew we were in the playoffs this past week and it was a whole different attitude," Litzenberger said. "To look around at all the faces, and to know that we are on a winning team was a great feeling."
Winning aside, the team has always prospered from a long line of social traditions, and while drinking is among them, team members are focused on other social aspects of the game. "People assume that after games we just drink, but it is one of the few sports where after the game you hang out with the people you play with," Foster continued. "On the pitch you get angry, but afterwards you put that aside, and talk to your opponents and partake in rugby traditions which have been going on for hundreds of years."
"You get to know people from other teams," Litzenberger said. "For example, the Northeastern girls. We beat them during the regular season, but they promised to come support us this weekend because we are all buddies with them."
After years of battling with the administration, the women's rugby team seems to be on track, both on and off the field. Regardless of the outcome of the weekend's tournament, the 13 seniors say they have left a lasting mark on Tufts' rugby teams for years to come.
"We've worked hard to change our image to not just become a winning team, but also a respectable team," Litzenberger said.
