The Penn State Women head to Grand Rapids, MI to start their National Play-Offs this weekend. On Friday the team plays West Chester and the winner of that game plays the winner of Northern Iowa and BYU.
The Lady Ruggers prepared for the play-offs with a game against rival Army at the west fields last Saturday. 2 tries by prop Hope Rogers in the first half helped the team build a 29-0 half time lead. As the teams used their subs in the second half Penn State kept their shape and play and 2 tries by Mel Hoffman pushed the score to 71-0 at the end.
“Army are a good team, but they caught us on a very good day,” said Pete Steinberg, Head Coach of the Penn State Women. “That game showed the benefit of going overseas and playing in Europe. We played some of the best teams in France and that taught us to play fast, faster than the game in the US.”
The team leaves Thursday morning for Michigan as healthy as they have been all season, with a number of players returning from injury. The first game is against in-state rival West Chester, a varsity program. West Chester came second in the Mason-Dixon conference to earn their spot in play-offs. Many of the players on both teams were recruited by the other school so it will be a good physical game.
The other side of the bracket is Northern Iowa, who won the Midwest Conference, and BYU who won the Pacific Mountain East conference. Penn State has played both before, and in fact has faced BYU the last 3 years!
Friday 2pm Penn State vs West Chester
Friday 4pm Northern Iowa vs BYU
Saturday 1pm Winner Match
You can follow the team this weekend on twitter @pennstaterugby.
