The USA Rugby DI Spring College Rankings consider teams that are building toward the spring college playoffs and championship. Candidates compete in the Blue Ridge (formerly Mason-Dixon), Florida, Pacific Desert and Pacific Mountain (North and West) conferences. The rankings do not include the four DI Elite programs or those DI teams that competed toward the fall college championship.
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Half of the field plays a split season, and those teams have played a healthy amount of 15s matches, league and friendly. The other half plays all of its league matches in the spring, and so it will take more time to get a solid read on those squads. Those insights have impacted the rankings and will continue to do so as the year progresses.
Reigning champion BYU tops the list and it would be no surprise to see the Cougars at No. 1 until May 2. The Provo, Utah program opened up its first Pacific Desert season (it was previously independent, and DI Elite before that) with a 56-0 win over Grand Canyon. Prop Pamela Patton, lock Marin Spears (2), wing Alisa Baker (T, C), fullback Tiana Tolman (3T, 2C), and reserves Kate Rugg, Breann Duce and Emma Bennion all scored tries.
The Lopes put up a good fight and are currently 2-1, having defeated last year’s champion UC Santa Barbara 19-5 in California and Arizona State 32-19 last weekend. Lindsey Mahoney is head coach, the Phoenix program’s third in three years, and had to rebuilt the roster around a handful of returners this season.
“ASU put up a great fight,” former Sun Devil Mahoney lauded the opposition. “We scored two back-to-back tries [Temprist Smith, Jasmine Fifer] early on and ASU responded with a good amount of pressure. Unfortunately, we racked up two yellow cards and quite a few penalties, but the girls were able to respond appropriately and make the corrections necessary to finish strong.”
Scrumhalf Ashley Jones also scored for GCU, while Stephanie Davies and Jane Lindsey dotted down for ASU and Raena Raebel added a conversion: 15-12 to Grand Canyon at the break. Davies scored shortly after the halftime whistle and Raebel’s conversion put the Sun Devils ahead 19-15.
“At half our aim was simply to apply pressure on defense to gain possession and score tries and they did just that,” the Lopes added tries from Smith, Sachiko Williams and Taylor Marasco (pictured below), and a Heather Thomas conversion. “Both teams performed well and it is great to see the standard of rugby being raised to a higher level in Arizona. Overall, continuously surprised and encouraged by my girls. I’m blessed to have such a resilient bunch who are willing to learn and put in the hard minutes.”
UC San Diego beat ASU in week one, 26-7, and CSU Northridge 24-17. Arizona got its first win of the season, 14-5 at UCLA.
Virginia Tech finished runner-up to BYU last year and is No. 2 in the rankings. The Hokies beat their Blue Ridge counterparts, both in matrix and friendlies, by large margins and asserted that they are again the team to beat in the Virginia-Carolinas region. Virginia Tech leads Blue Ridge’s West pool and will play NC State, Clemson and USC this spring to close out matrix play.
Virginia Women’s Rugby (UVA) leads the Blue Ridge East, having defeated James Madison and East Carolina by Virginia Tech margins. The Hokies will replay those teams and also play fellow pool member UNC twice, among other friendlies, this spring.
The University of Central Florida (UCF) is third and opened the Florida league with an 83-0 win over Florida. Of the 15 tries, only three players scored twice: lock Laurell Cuza and wings Julia Mortellaro and Kya Willams. UCF did a great job spreading the ball around, as hooker Kayli Hannah, prop Lil’China La’Teal Davis, locks Eva Esperanza and Laurell Cuza (2), flankers Madi Woodson and Sofia Uribe, No. 8 Christina Norman, scrumhalf Gabrielle Pennino, flyhalf Audrey Platta and inside center Madeleine Ross also scored. Ross, fullback Mary Watkins and reserve Dasha Plotnikov kicked the conversions.
Last year, for the first time since the spring championships formed, a Pacific Mountain West team did not win the title or advance to the semifinals. UCSB took that berth but looks to be rebuilding, like Grand Canyon, this year, and thus Stanford comes in at No. 4. The Cardinal beat UC Davis 20-0 in their league opener and then put down DI newcomer and Humboldt State replacement Fresno State – also the reigning DII spring champion – 50-19.
Last weekend, Davis hosted a double-header, beating Cal 12-10 on Friday and then losing to Chico State 19-14. A harbinger for another competitive, win-exchanging season? Here’s hoping.
Finally, Western Washington has impressed with a 4-0 record in the Pacific Mountain North and played its closest match thus far again Oregon (31-27) and the Ducks are also on the watch list. Historically, the PMRC West is stronger than its northern counterpart, but given the Vikings’ number of successful matches and massive win over traditional leader Washington State, the Bellingham school gets the nod in the opening ranking.
Also, for the first ranking, we included each team’s CIPP roster (less coaches and admin) as reference. That column will be replaced with “previous rank” in subsequent lists.
