Rugby Axewomen capture championship convincingly

(ANTIGONISH, N.S.) – The Acadia Axewomen are 2015 AUS women's rugby champions after a 34-17 victory over the StFX X-Women Friday night in front of 500 fans at StFX Oland Stadium.

The Axewomen claimed their first-ever conference title in team history, snapping a 17-year winning streak by the X-Women.

Axewomen head coach Matt Durant, in his sixth season as bench boss, was ecstatic after the game when asked about the win, commenting, "It feels phenomenal. We've been bridesmaids for so many years and it feels great to finally close out an AUS championship with a win."

"We knew if we could start strong we could do really special things," continued Durant. "We've had a tendency of starting a little bit slow this year and tonight we had a great first 10-15 minutes and we just took it from there, we really executed our game plan the way we planned."

Fourth-year fly half Maddie MacKenzie (Peterborough, Ont.) scored three tries for the Axewomen and received Subway player of the game honours as the championship MVP.

MacKenzie expressed her emotions after the game commenting, "It is surreal, it honestly doesn't feel real. It's been so long, I've been here for four years and there's girls on the team who have been here for five-six years and we've been working for this for so long. We used to get pommelled by X and the last few years we've really stepped it up and tonight's win is such an amazing feeling, I really can't describe it."

The first scoring in the game came from the X-Women who were pressuring 10 minutes in, as their forwards were moving the ball well. As they maintained pressure close to the Acadia try line, second-year prop Joanna Alphonso (Ajax, Ont.) pushed across the try line in the 14^th minute of play in what was her first of three tries on the evening.

The X-Women Subway player of the game, Alphonso led the conference in tries scored this year with nine and was named the AUS most valuable player for her league play after the match.

Sabrina McDaid (Scarborough, Ont.) made good on the convert from the Alphonso try to give the X-Women an early 7-0 lead.

MacKenzie tied the game when she broke through the StFX defence to run in for her first try of the night from 20 yards out in the 20^th minute. Scrumhalf Jenny Matheson (Halifax, N.S.) connected for the conversion.

As Acadia was pressuring 25 minutes in, StFX took a couple penalties from just 10 yards out, including a yellow card to Jaelei Meyer (Carlyle, Sask.), and the Axewomen took advantage of the good field position as MacKenzie made good on her second try, sprinting down the sideline to score an unconverted try and give Acadia a 12-7 lead.

StFX came back strong with punishing hits by Catharine MacKeigan (Toronto, Ont.) and Alphonso, helping to lead the ball deep into Acadia territory, but ended up turning it over after getting into more penalty trouble.

Veteran fifth-year lock Veronique Russell (Markham, Ont.) broke through the StFX defence and went on a long run to help lead to Acadia's third try of the night. That came in the 34^th minute from Emma DeLory (Halifax, N.S.).

Before the half was over, Axewomen co-captain Janice Cougle (Lethbridge, Alta.) went down after a big hit by Alphonso, though she would return to the game in the second half.

The Axewomen held a 17-7 lead at halftime.

The defending national champion X-Women came out strong in the second half, scoring just three minutes in as Alphonso scored her second try of the night. The conversion attempt was just missed by McDaid, leaving the score 17-12 in favor of the Axewomen.

Alphonso then scored again in the 52^nd minute, using her physical presence to move the ball. The McDaid conversion attempt wide as X-Women tied the game at 17-17.

Acadia came right back with a try of their own as Gillian Bergsma (Waterford, Ont.) broke through the StFX defence and scored in the 53^rd minute.

Danielle Wisen (Wellington, N.S.) scored just three minutes later for the Axewomen, again finding a seam in the StFX defence and running the ball in from 30 yards out to give them a 10-point advantage, 27-17.

After StFX gained valuable field position midway through the second half, they turned the ball over and were unable to close the gap on the scoreboard.

Frantic cheers of "Go X Go" from Oland Stadium with 10 minutes left to play were unable to propel the 17-time defending champions to a comeback.

MacKenzie sealed the victory for the Axewomen with a 40-yard sprint to the try line with eight minutes left in the game to give the Axewomen the 34-17 edge. Acadia held on for the win with solid defence.

AUS coach of the year Mike Cavanagh commented, "I give full credit to Acadia for playing the full 80 minutes. I thought that in the second half when we came out and tied it up, we had a shot of winning the game. We had some missed tackles here and there and Acadia took advantage of it. Penalty calls also killed our momentum and in the end we ran out of gas."

Both the Axewomen and X-Women will advance to the CIS national championship next weekend in Kingston, Ont., being hosted by Queen's University, as the change to an eight-team format allows for two representatives from the AUS conference. The championship is scheduled for Nov. 5-8.

SCORING SUMMARY
ACA 17-17: 34
StFX 7-10: 17 

First half
StFX – Joanna Alphonso try, 14^th minute (Sabrina McDaid convert)
ACA – Maddie MacKenzie try, 20^th minute (Jenny Matheson convert)
ACA – Maddie MacKenzie try, 27^th minute
ACA – Emma DeLory try, 34^th minute 

Second half
StFX – Joanna Alphonso try, 43^rd minute
StFX – Joanna Alphonso try, 52^nd minute
ACA – Gillian Bergsma try, 53^rd minute
ACA – Danielle Wisen try, 56^th minute
ACA – Maddie MacKenzie, 72^nd minute (Jenny Matheson convert) 

Players of the Game:
Maddie MacKenzie, ACA
Joanna Alphonso, StFX 

Legend:
Try: 5 points
Penalty goal: 3 points
Convert: 2 points

Provided by StFX Athletics

Source: StFX Sports Communications