Harvard's varsity women's rugby team won the Ivy League championship

In their first varsity season, Harvard's women's rugby team won the Ivy League championship.

The Harvard varsity women’s rugby team opened their initial season in style, bagging the Ivy League championship with a 29-0 victory over Dartmouth in the final of the Ancient Eight tourney in Hanover, New Hampshire on November 3.  Only a few months ago, women’s rugby became Harvard’s forty-second varsity sport. Under the leadership of coach Sue Parker, the ruggers compiled a 5-2 record, suffering losses only to Quinnipiac  (39-10) in their first varsity game and to Dartmouth (10-5), their first away opponent.

Yet the resilient ruggers bounced back from the Quinnipiac loss by demolishing Yale, 84-0, at home, and won their final four contests over Brown, Princeton, Brown again (Ivy semifinal), and Dartmouth. The Big Green were seeded first, the Crimson second, in the Ivy tournament, but Harvard kept the Hanover women off the scoreboard in nailing down the title. A measure of Harvard’s dominance is that those four season-closing victories saw them outscoring opponents 153-12. Harvard will compete in the USA Rugby 7s tournament at Texas A&M on November 22 through 24.  

 

Related topics

You might also like

What Does the $2.8B NCAA Settlement Mean for Harvard?

Athlete-payment case will change little for Ivy League athletes.

Filmmaker John Armstrong’s Adventure Documentaries

Filmmaker John Armstrong’s “outdoor adventures” find the human spirit.

The Woman Who Rode Horses Into the Water

Scrapbooking a woman who rode horses into the sea

Most popular

How MAGA Went Mainstream at Harvard

Trump, TikTok, and the pandemic are reshaping Gen Z politics.

Shakespeare’s Greatest Rival

Without Christopher Marlowe, there might not have been a Bard.

Harvard art historian Jennifer Roberts teaches the value of immersive attention

Teaching students the value of deceleration and immersive attention

Explore More From Current Issue

Johnston Gate

Your Views on Harvard’s Standoff, Antisemitism, and More

Readers comment on the controversial July-August cover, authoritarianism, and scientific research.

Renaissance portrait of young man thought to be Christoper Marlowe with light beard, wearing ornate black coat with gold buttons and red patterns.

Shakespeare’s Greatest Rival

Without Christopher Marlowe, there might not have been a Bard.

Man in gray sweater standing in hallway with colorful abstract art on wall.

How Do Single-Celled Organisms Learn and Remember?

A Harvard neuroscientist’s quest to model memory