A small but talented NOVA women 7’s team embarked to Bermuda for the 4th Annual Easter 7’s Tournament. This year marked the inaugural year of a women’s tackle bracket being included in the tournament, as Bermuda Women’s Rugby sides play touch rugby. There were three sides entered in the bracket, NOVA, Empire City Blues, consisting of New York players, and a mixed Bermuda side, made up of women on the island interested in playing tackle rugby. The team included: Dana Creager, CJ Hildreth, Katie “Yahoo” Miller, Kristen “JB” Campbell, Rookie Kigin, Beth Black, and Megan “5-0” Hansen, with Lindsey Brizendine, Patch Joerger, and 5-0’s Mom serving as subs only in the case of a severe maiming or death of one of the players (Luckily the subs’ services were not needed).

NOVA’s first game was against the Bermuda team, a team that had never played a tackle game of rugby before. The NOVA women were able to exploit the inexperience of the Bermuda team to come away with an easy win. Dana Creager scored 2 tries, Katie “Yahoo” Miller and Kristen “JB” Campbell each contributed 1, and Beth Black put in 2, as well as wowing the drunk crowd with her kicking skills and putting 2 conversions through the posts. The final score was 36-0. The NOVA women were gracious opponents, taking opportunities to give some pointers to the 7’s novices throughout the game. The pointers proved useful, as in Bermuda’s game against the Empire City Blues, they were able to score a try off the opening kickoff.

NOVA’s next opponent, the Empire City Blues, would prove to be a bit tougher. However, NOVA was able to use their strength of superior speed to exploit the slower Empire City Blues team. NOVA was able to come away with a win, and clinched a berth into the finals. Tries were scored by Dana Creager and Beth Black, the final score was 10-8.

During a break in the competition the tournament sponsored a kicking contest, in which NOVA’s own coach, Kaitlin “Patch” Joerger was entered. The conditions were not favorable for a novice kicker, as the Bermuda breeze was blowing quite strong. Four other women were entered in the competition, a New York player, Kooch, who is a fly-half by training, a Bermuda player, and two Bacardi bar girls. The rules were simple, kick until you miss, as the tee is placed further away from the uprights after each round. The bar girls were quickly eliminated, as they had no experience at all. The Bermuda girl hung in there for three rounds, but missed when the tee moved out of her range. That left Patch and Kooch, playing for a $75 purse for the winner and a $25 for second place. Patch stepped up to tee, took a deep breath and kicked, the ball floated up, but the wind picked up and took the ball left of the posts. Disappointing, but at least the $25 prize was clinched. Patch waited while Kooch took her kick, and amazingly she missed! Patch was still in the competition! Another deep breath, Patch stepped up to the tee, said a little prayer to Baby Jesus, and kicked. The ball floated up and sneaked through the uprights, just inside the left post. The pressure was on Kooch, she had to make it to keep the competition going. She kicked, and a gust from the heavens pushed the ball wide of the posts…Patch won! Patch won! She did a celebratory cartwheel, collected her winnings, congratulated Kooch on a well fought competition, and ran down the sidelines, thanking all her supporting fans.

With the Kicking Competition Winner among the NOVA ranks, it was now time for the NOVA sevens team to bring home the tournament trophy. NOVA met the Empire City Blues again in the tournament finals. Dana Creager and Coach Patch made some tweaks to the game plan in order to exploit the opponent’s weaknesses and take advantage of NOVA’s strengths. NOVA went into the game looking to avoid contact and use their speed to run around the Empire City team. The team executed the plan well and it proved effective as NOVA came away with a 32-5 win, with Dana Creager scoring a hat-trick, one off of a line-out stolen by CJ, CJ Hildreth, using her deceptive running skills to avoid several tackles, scoring two, Katie “Yahoo” Miller scoring one, and Beth Black making 3 of her conversions.

The NOVA champions came away from the tournament with a bottle of Bacardi rum, 11 Bacardi t-shirts, a wooden Champions plaque, and a cash prize of $1500, and $75 won by Patch in the kicking contest. All-in-all a successful and lucrative tournament.

Off the pitch the NOVA women also left their mark on the island, having a blast tooling about the island on their scooters, enjoying the hot tub at Keith’s house, entertaining the locals at the bars, and earning free drinks. It can be stated without a doubt that this was pretty much the best tour ever, and we can’t wait until next year!

- Tour Journal Writer, Patch

 

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