USA captain Tiffany Faaee /// Photo: Paul Rudman / KLC fotos (see more)
The USA Women’s National Team is back to work in Chula Vista, Calif., looking to make some positive strides after Tuesday’s 39-5 loss to Canada. Eagle captain and prop Tiffany Faaee zeroed in on a few areas for improvement after game one of the Can-Am series.
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During game one, 25 minutes elapsed before the scoreboard lit up, as Canada’s Karen Paquin finished off a blocked-kick opportunity deep in the USA’s end. Alev Kelter finished an immediate American response in the try zone, and Canada finished the 40 with its second of seven tries on the day, 10-5 at the half.
Canada flanker Karen Paquin (Photo: Jackie Finlan)
“We thought we had a really good first half, and we talked about our defense and wanting to improve that in the second half,” Faaee recalled the halftime chat. “Canada obviously still came punching through the middle, so we just had to adjust, and I think they caught us on the back foot too many times.”
Canada scored two tries in the opening 10 minutes of the second half.
“The more momentum they got, the faster they got, the wider they got,” Faaee said. “They got more confident and started to get their offload game on. We just need to work on that squeeze defense a little bit more. Our launch was one of our main focuses; we were coming up. The step that we need to work on a little bit is squeezing on that ball to stop Canada from moving it in the tackle.”
Sylvia Braaten chasing down a kick (Photo: Jackie Finlan)
As the game wore on, the Eagles hurt themselves with unforced errors, and its scrum struggled.
“We knew that Canada had a strong, low scrum. We’ve been working hard on getting a bit lower with them,” Faaee said. “Jojo [Kitlinski] did a really good job stepping up last minute. [Katy Augustyn] injured herself yesterday during one of our practice runs. So [it was] us having to adjust and have a feel around with Canada. Probably need to go back and work on a few defensive moves to counter.”
The USA staff had added Liz Kirk as a technical scrum coach to address some of those concerns.
“For our forwards, it’s our first time with a scrum coach, so it’s exciting,” the front row said. “Liz didn’t put much pressure on us; just said, ‘Let’s try a couple of things and see where we go.’ She was really excited about watching [Tuesday] and getting that platform to see how we can build.”
Canada No. 8 Kelly Russell peeling off the back (Photo: Jackie Finlan)
Faaee acknowledged the positives from the match, like the collegians and young (experience wise) reserves who performed well; and the connectivity of the squad despite last seeing each other in December.
“The 7s girls, they’ve had to work really hard to learn the 15s habits,” Faaee also praised the backs. “And we’ve asked them to forget what they’ve been doing on the [World Rugby 7s] circuit and come and learn our structure, and it showed today that they’ve been working really hard and showed discipline.”
Surely there was a level of disappointment with the result, but there was also an immediate desire to get back on the pitch and improve on Tuesday’s performance. That’s the attitude one would expect of a national team player.
“We talked a lot about how we don’t have the advantage of playing together, and so we have to work hard and push,” Faaee said. “And we did ask a lot of the girls to really try and gel in the short. Game two will be a little bit different after this.”
Saturday’s 3 p.m. rematch at the Chula Vista Elite Athlete Center will be proceeded by SoCal U14 and U16 7s round robins; Fallbrook U18 vs. South Bay U18; and San Diego Surfers vs. Belmont Shore. This USA vs. Canada game is open to the public (event link) and will also be live-streamed via The Rugby Channel.
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