Team photo from the last DII NERFU season in fall 2019
Albany is 2-0 in DII New England, a region that will name its club champions by the end of 2021. There’s little knowledge of what happens after that, but no one’s really talking about regional playoffs at this juncture. The Knicks are enjoying their time back on the pitch, reinvesting in a supportive, fun culture, and eager to see where that strategy leads in the future.
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Albany was like many teams during the Covid-19 playing hiatus and attempted to connect virtually. But the break served as different pivot points for players and coaches alike.
“Some people needed a break in an odd way,” Albany coach Lori Staples said. “For me, I was starting to get burnt out from coaching for seven years. I don’t want to say that I lost my way, but I wasn’t being true to myself coaching wise. So the break was a strange blessing for me.”
When rugby did return to the pitch, Staples was pleasantly surprised with the returning numbers, and there was a nice influx of recent college graduates to boot. The Knicks enjoyed a longer-than-normal build to the summer Can-Am 15s tournament, and as everyone relished the opportunity to be back on the pitch playing again, Staples wanted to make sure the team was resetting in the right way.
“When we were coming out of Covid, we were trying to be much more intentional about our club culture,” Staples said. “I had the girls do an exercise where they wrote their ‘Why’s’ for playing rugby on index cards, and we came up with some team values around that. One of the common themes was people just want to have fun. They want to feel like they’re part of a family. So we’re trying to keep that as our core as we approach each game. New players are mixed with senior players on the field, and so far it’s been O.K. Everyone is really supportive, even with the mistakes you typically get with new people coming together.”
Captains Michaela Conway and Amy Hait are setting the tone there.
“Mich has more experience, and Amy was one of our younger players a couple of years ago but has now developed into a team leader,” Staples said of the lock and fullback, respectively. “They draw on different strengths and are a good captaining couple.”
Assistant coach Nicole Gonyeau has also been a great asset and is a player-coach in the forwards. The pack has good experience in the front row, making set pieces, notably scrums, a strength for Albany.
In the backs, flyhalf Catherine Lowerre has been crucial. The vet is working with a set of new scrumhalves and has been very supportive in the recent college grads’ education.
“As we approached the season and as we approach each game, we’re trying to be more specific about what success looks like to us,” Staples said of team goals. “We’re trying to break it down into little pieces. Part of that is because we do have so many new players and we want to make sure they have a couple of things they can go back to and control, whether it’s making tackles or having good passes or being low in contact.
“Obviously we want to be competitive,” the coach continued. “We tell everyone that it’s good to push each other and have high standards, but again we’re trying to fall back on the fact that we’re here to have fun and play rugby and see where that takes us.”
The DII New England season started against Charles River, and Albany’s veteran leadership stepped up in the 24-3 win. The Knicks rescheduled its subsequent game against Portland, affording the only bye week of the fall. Meanwhile, Providence defeated Burlington 42-31 and DIII South Shore 27-5 prior to facing Albany.
“Providence is a perennial playoff winner and always tough and always well coached,” Staples said. “Leading into the game, since we had so many new people, I told them that, yes, this is going to be tough, but embrace the competition because this is an opportunity for us to get better.”
Albany hosted the match and Staples described a back-and-forth game between teams playing similarly styled rugby.
“They typically have a very good backline and that was the case this time around, too,” Staples said. “We just knew the breakdowns would be important. They are good at counter-rucking, so we had to secure our ball. And we did a good job of recognizing when we didn’t have a solid counter-ruck, to just get out and ready for the next phase on defense. We were both trying to attack in tight with the forwards and look for the holes that sometimes open up in backline. There were some mistakes – a line-break and then someone would scrape across and make the try-saving tackle – that sort of thing.”
Albany led by two points as the final five minutes approached. The Knicks botched a lineout deep in their own end, and Providence spent the rest of the game attacking in Albany’s 22. The defense was able to rally and keep the scoreboard at 17-15, Albany’s win.
“Both teams did some really great things and also had some miscues where we could have opened the game up more,” Staples summarized. “It was mostly just a hard-fought defensive battle. It was a lot of tackling for us. Two of our tries were on the very outside, so that game could have easily gone the other way. If we had played another five minutes, they could have won.”
There wasn’t too much celebration after the final whistle, as the teams regrouped for a B side match. But Albany was proud of its drain-the-tank effort at the end of the game and the win that resulted.
“So far, so good,” Staples said. “Pre-Covid, Worcester was really stepping up so we expect that game to be hard, too. But on any given day in our division, any other team could beat another one, so you have to on all the time.”
There are seven teams in DII, and their fall schedules also include a DIII crossover. Albany will go straight through Oct. 30, and then the New England playoffs begin the first weekend of November.
“It’s a long season,” Staples said. “I’ve been coaching long enough where we’ve had seasons that start off great and then halfway through you invariably hit bumps in the road, whether they’re disagreements on the pitch or key people get injured. So we’re trying to be much more intentional about our culture, so if and when things don’t go our way, hopefully we’ll be able to fall back on that and keep things together.”
DII NERFU results thus far (DIII crossovers not included):
Albany 24-3 Charles River
Albany 17-15 Providence
Worcester 59-0 Hartford
Worcester 52-5 Charles River
Providence 42-31 Burlington
Portland 44-12 Hartford
Hartford 27-7 Burlington
Burlington 19-12 Charles River