After showing improvement, the men’s rugby team ended its season in a loss to Saint Mary’s College of California (SMC) on April 10. With a final score of 38-17, head coach Todd Thornley said the team learned a lot from the match.

According to Wildcatsports.com, Thornely said slow starts and not matching the pace set by SMC were reasons the team ultimately fell, and said that was something he intends to fix.  

With the team’s morale high, the players looked forward to the match against SMC and had planned to secure another victory.

“We’re gonna do what we’re good at,” senior wing player Max Riseham said. “We’re gonna go all out and do the best we can because it could be the last game for us seniors.”

After last year’s season getting preemptively canceled, the men’s rugby team was struggling to find its rhythm at the start of this year’s season. The team suffered a loss against Lindenwood in the season opener on March 13.

“We knew not playing a year would take a toll on us,”  senior rugby player Alex Mackenzie said. “The team tried their best but didn’t get the results that we wanted. Right now we have a lot to work on.” 

With the men’s rugby team slowly improving game after game, it can be seen that the players learned from their mistakes. 

“The team didn’t do lineups very well. So we took the time to get that problem fixed during our practices,” Riseham said.

After facing off against Arizona on March 27, CWU secured its first win of the season. The team was ecstatic to know that all its hard work paid off.

“It felt good seeing the results of our efforts. Putting [47 points] on them was a real confidence booster,” Riseham said. “We were all doing the right things, putting all the material we learnt from practice into the game.”

According to Riseham, the match against Arizona reassured him that the team’s synergy was improving because the players were executing plays properly, communicating on the field and looking out for one another. He said the overall performance of the team felt better than their previous matches.

“Having that day be senior day a lot of the [players] wanted to play for each other,” Mackenzie said. “The [teams] whole mentality was different and our performance was much better that day.”