Bloodletting
The Utah State’s women’s rugby team is preparing to face off against BYU Saturday for the annual Bloodletting game, a tradition that combines the heat of competition with the chill of Logan snow.
“It’s supposed to just be a fun game,” junior Brooke Lambert, who plays inside center for the team, said. “We just play in about 2 feet of snow, so it’s not like a real serious game. You go out and you have fun.”
Have fun, and blood let?
“UVSC are more our rivals, I guess (than BYU). It’s more intense with UVSC … There has definitely been some talking on the field there. But BYU is a lot nicer, we get along with thbm pretty well,” Lambert said.
So maybe “Bloodletting” is a misnomer, but that doesn’t mean the USU team isn’t tough. After going 13-1 in the fall season and taking fifth at nationals last year, the Aggies have set their sights on placing even higher this year.
They have already qualified for the playoffs, which begin in April.
“We have a great group of girls, and a great coaching staff,” senior Sara Gilmore said. “Our main goal is to make it to finals and take nationals.
“Our team is strong enough, but we need to focus and work hard.”
That team, which consists of about 30 girls, ranges in experience, but players catch on quickly. The large team allows for a grace period for newer players.
“It’s good, because most people that come in and start playing rugby don’t start playing until college,” Lambert said. “People are like, ‘I don’t want to play, I don’t know how,’ but that’s how we all started out, so it’s a good team.
Gilmore agreed that it’s a learning experience.
“I really like playing rugby because it keeps you in good shape, and you’re always learning something new. There’s always something new to learn about the game,” she said.
After the Bloodletting game, Salt Lake will be coming, along with Idaho State University, but the games will not be played “against” those teams. In rugby, if a team has too few players, it borrows players from its opponents. USU players will therefore be playing against their own, because neither Salt Lake nor ISU is bringing a full team.
Lambert said anyone interested in playing for the women’s rugby team just has to come to practice. Practices are held at 9:15 p.m. on Tuesdays at the Fieldhouse, and will be moved outside within the next few weeks, depending on weather, she said.
“It’s a very social sport,” Lambert said. “A team will come up and play us, and then we go to the Factory Pizzeria and buy them pizza after the game, and vice versa. And it’s like that everywhere.”
-jenbeasley@cc.usu.edu