Axewomen improve to 3-1 with win over Huskies

WOLFVILLE, N.S. – The Axewomen rugby team picked up their second win against the Huskies in their last meeting of regular season in a 88-5 win.

First year hooker, Lauren Melanson, was named the AUS Subway Player of the Game for her three trys for the Axewomen.

Senior 8-man Danielle Wisen recorded two early first half trys separated by Laura Pfleiderer's only try of the day. Melanson added two of her three trys in the first half and Natasha Wotton and Wisen posted one each for the Axewomen's 39 points in the first half. Two conversions were added by Laura Pfleiderer and Lauren Humby.

The Huskies scored their only try at the 37 minute of the opening half. Several times it looked as though Acadia had sustained the pressure and defended their try zone but Saint Mary's continued to press, forcing Acadia to take several penalties before Teaghen Phillips finally bulled across for the Huskies to put them on the board

Strong words of encouragement from Head Coach Matt Durant at half-time sparked the Acadia side as they flew out of the gate and scored 9 unanswered tries in the 2^nd half against a spirited and determined Huskies side.

Melanson opened the second half two minutes into regulation time. Bailey Dembicki and Harley Tucker added trys at the 47 and 51 minute marks.

Natasha Johnson scored four trys at the 54, 56, 65 and 74 minutes. Seniors Tamara Dondi and Angela Govier each added a try to the 88 point total. Conversions in the second half were made by Humby and Jessie Bryan.

"It was a great performance today by many of our players.  We had made some difficult decisions this week after some mediocre performances by some of our core players in the past couple of games, and it worked out really well.  It is clear that our team is full of strong, competitive players, and it showed today," said Axewomen head coach Matthew Durant following the game. 

"I thought the Huskies played the best I'd seen them play in a while, and that really motivated our team.  I think Amber (Davison) is doing some great things with their program, and they played significantly better today than they did when we were at SMU," noted Durant.

"They really pushed us at times, and they earned piles of respect from us today.  Thankfully our team showed up ready to play. We had a real wake-up call a week ago, and it sparked a competitive chord for our team.  There were still lots of mistakes today, but the sustained effort and focus was back; I was really happy with how we played today," concluded Durant.

The Axewomen travel to UPEI next Saturday, Oct. 7 at 2:00 p.m., while the Huskies host undefeated StFX this Wednesday night.