Aggie women’s rugby falls to Montana State 36-26 for the second year in a row

The Aggie women’s rugby team couldn’t maul through the Montana State Bobcats Saturday afternoon. The final score was 36-26 in favor for the Bobcats — the same score of when the Aggies played up at MSU last season.

The difference between this year and last years match is to get the win MSU had to play their starters for most of the match.

“The scoring happened differently all of their points were in the first half,” said Aggie head coach Theresa Pitts-Singer. “Then they put subs in and we were able to score.”

Utah State played well in bunches and started and finished the first half well.

“Everyone was communicating,” said Aggie scrum half Sabrina Anderson. “We did a great job at ball handling.”

The Aggies scored three straight tries with the final try of the first half scored by the fullback Sarah Klepich. Klepich was running to the corner of the try zone, the Bobcats tried to take her into touch, but she did a nice spin to dive and touch the ball down for the try.

It was the middle 20 minutes, though, that the Aggies’ got behind. The Bobcats were a lot bigger and could control the scrum easier and the Aggies had a few turnovers because of a turned scrum. In the second half, MSU went on a 19 point run and never looked back.

The Aggies did get one more try in to score, but the Bobcats quickly answered back to make the score 36-26. Utah State continued to push the ball but they ran out of time.

Losing by ten points to a team that has beat other schools by 50 plus points, is a moral victory, if you believe in them.

“Next time we see Montana State in the conference tournament,” Pitts-Singer said, “we plan to beat them.”

Legacy Fields will host a full day of rugby Saturday starting with Utah State women’s rugby facing off against Boise State at 11 a.m. and men’s rugby playing Colorado State at 1 p.m.