Rugby Axewomen remain undefeated with win over SMU

(HALIFAX, NS)—The Saint Mary's Huskies dropped their home opener 77-7 Sunday afternoon at Huskies Stadium to the Acadia Axewomen in Atlantic University Sport rugby action.

In a game marred by handling errors, the AUS conference runners-up last season, sprinted out to a 34-7 halftime lead before second-half scores of 49-7, 54-7, and the final try at 77-7.

Acadia wasted little time getting on the board when second year prop Emma Pfleiderer rumbled over the try line to give Acadia an early 5-0 lead, less than 5 minutes into the game.

Natasha Johnson (2), Annie Kennedy, Tamara Dondi and Danielle Wisen also all scored in the first half, while SMU scored a lone converted try from Julie Naugler (converted by Elisn Redshaw) for a 34-7 halftime score.

Acadia wasted little time getting to work in the second half.  Laura Pfleiderer, Sophie Pickard and Tamara Dondi all scored for Acadia within the first 10 minutes of the frame. 

Harley Tucker and Monique Coffey added second half trys after several hard runs that had the Huskies scrambling to reset their defence.  Tamara Dondi, Danielle Wisen and Laura Pfleiderer scored second try's in the second half and Laura Pfleiderer added 4 second half conversions.

"It is a difficult thing to be critical when you win by 70 points, but we did a lot of little things poorly today.  Encouragingly, our team recognizes how poor we were at times and they are as frustrated as the coaching staff, which is encouraging.  I was really pleased with some of the performances today, but some people certainly didn't put in their best efforts.  We will need to be better going forward," said head coach Matthew Durant following the game.

With the win, the Axewomen improve to 2-0 and sit tied atop the AUS standings with the StFX X-Women, last year's national champions.. Both teams return to action September 23rd when Acadia visits StFX and Saint Mary's travels to 0-2 UPEI. Game time for both games is 2 p.m. Atlantic.