The day began a little rocky, while trying to find a fabric store to get foam to use as goal post pads (which I found out we didn't have any the night before) I was informed that the current lines on the field we very faint and might need a going over. Again, we didn't have any of the materials available, and upon finally finding the foam, I was going to purchase the field marking equipment but was told by the club officers that we'll do without it, but to just get there. Note, it was already 1:20pm and we wanted the match to start roughly 1:00pm. Once I got to the field, all the players quickly came over picked up our brand spanking new school colored jerseys. socks, match balls and foam for the goal posts and quickly went about taking care of business while I sorted out the lineup, and giving the referee the proper paperwork to start the match. Finally we have everything done and pregame talks over with, let the games begin.
The match began about 1:50pm with UTD receiving the kick off, it was great watching the green and orange running around the field. Defensively both teams were keen and hitting hard, there were a few wows from the side lines because of those hits, but it was UTD that started the scoring, Nathan scored the game opener with a beautiful open field run. we missed the conversion. Then Lamar utilized the speed they had on the outside and scored 2 Trys themselves and like us they missed both of the conversions. Lamar seemed to be on their way to a 3rd first half score when one of their fast backs broke through our defense and saw nothing but green in front of him, but our number 8 - Steve H., with support from the fullback Steve S. and wing Marc ran him down and made a beautiful Try saving tackle, and UTD wasn't going to be stopped. This time it was Dominic with a huge run and great burst of speed scored the game tying Try to end the first half, UTD 10 - Lamar 10.
The line up for the 1st half was:
1. Nick Walker, 2. Zeng (Dwight) Yuxiang, 3. Erbold Uran, 4. John Bradshaw, 5. Weston Hearne, 6. Ben Bales, 7. Zack Ussery, 8. Steve Hale, 9. Cameron Broussard, 10. Stephen Boeding, 11. Ross Chan, 12. Dominic Prestia, 13. Nathan Sohadaseni. 14. Marc Hudak, 15. Steve Shaffer
The second half began with a few changes to the line up - not that those players were playing badly, but to give a needed spark to the game, since they were fresh, those changes seemed to be what we needed. Defensively, UTD was very good, especially when Lamar gave the ball to some of their rather large players and when Lamar tried to use that same speed on the outside, they were shut down. But now it was UTD's turn to turn on the speed and open up with a flurry of Try scoring opportunities. I can't remember the order of the Trys but here's recap on how the Trys were scored.
Nathan again using his speed and with the assist from Dominic scored a really nice Try in this half.
Cameron scored on a broken play from about 5 yards out, assist went to the forwards.
Ben (this was my personal favorite) scored off of our Line Out from about 10 yards out from a play we had been working on for the past 2 weeks. He saw the opportunity, made the call John caught the throw and dished it out to Ben who turned the corner and had only Lamar's small wing to stop him which he couldn't. SWEET!!!
Alejandro then scored himself from about 70 yards out sprinting past and away from the rest of the Lamar defense.
The match ended with UTD winning their first league match in school history 34 to Lamar's 10. This was a huge match for the lads and their conditioning is really starting to pay off, but we aren't going to rest on this because we still have two more league matches to play this fall.
The line up for the second half:
1. Nick Walker, 2. Anthony Paradowski, 3. Erbold Uran, 4. John Bradshaw, 5. Weston Hearne, 6. Ben Bales, 7. Zack Ussery, 8. Steve Hale, 9. Cameron Broussard, 10. Nathan Sohadaseni, 11. Alejandro Chinchilla, 12. Dominic Prestia, 13. Brandon Miller. 14. Marc Hudac, 15. Steve Shaffer
Coming in the second half - Chad McDonald for Brandon, Josef Velten for Erbold, Parker Hannah for Marc.
We have the weekend of Nov. 5th off and will have our next league match Saturday, Nov. 12th against Tyler Jr. College. This will be a Home match for your lads of the UT Dallas Rugby Club and we're working with our Recreation Sports Director Chris McAlpine to hopefully have a field on campus to play this match. I'll have to send out another e-mail to you all the week of this match with all the information on if we're successful in acquiring a field along with a scouting report on Tyler JC.
I'd like to thank everyone of you that came out yesterday to watch this exciting match and for some of you this was a drive from Houston and Austin. This means a lot to them and ME and without your support on the sidelines we'd be playing matches to empty side lines, except for the friends and girl-friends the players have who come out.
In closing, we're about to open a UT Dallas web site so that all the supporters of the UT Dallas Rugby Football Club can go to to catch up on all the goings on and news of your team. When we get this up and going, you will be notified.
Also, since this game may be different from anything you have ever seen, I thought you might want to know a little more about it. There is a book "Rugby for Dummies" written by Patrick Guthrie and Matthew Brown. This is a very good book, because it will explain the laws of the game, position break downs and many interesting stories about rugby and the traditions of rugby.