Solid Showing Once Again for Mount St. Mary's
Solid Showing Once Again for Mount St. Mary's
Mount St. Mary's produced their second straight solid result against well-regarded opponents, this time winning a Rugby East Conference clash with rivals Mary Washington 33-20.
It was a strong showing from Mount, who have a good rivalry with UMW but are a bit more experienced this year.
"We're blessed," said Jay Myles, which is a typical thing for him to say. "We've got a lot of experienced players who are in leadership positions and who serve as mentors for us. And we also have a bunch of talented freshmen who are eager to learn and willing to be mentored, which is really important."
MSM ran out to a 22-3 lead at halftime and everything seemed to be ticking over nicely. But they may have eased off just as Mary Washington made some adjustments, and as a result UMW was able to close the gap.
"We felt we did pretty well but we also had a lot of opportunities for us to grow in this game," said Myles, who added praise for his opponents and their new Head Coach, Andrew Spencer. "UMW came to play and Andrew is doing a great job for them. For us, in the first half our ball-handling was working really well. In the second half I think we lost a bit of focus and Mary Washington are so tenacious."
Off the bench freshman Jack Lamotta was a powerful presence who raised the energy.
"He has really embraced our system," added Myles.
Overall, though, there's a bit of a task for MSM to fold in a big freshman class with the older players, and Myles said that's the work of his coaching staff.
Mike Keifer and Chet Rockwood go yeoman work with the forwards both at the set piece and in the breakdown, with the two working together but splitting areas of expertise. Tyler Mylers has taken on Attack Coach duties and that's working nicely, while Kyle Powers has now been promoted to Associate Head Coach, which is crucial when you have a program with over 100 players.
That's also why recent MSM standout Ray McGettigan is so important, as he works closely with the Development group and, Myles acknowledges, may have a clearer line of communication with the younger players.
So the pieces are there.
With this game MSM moves to 1-0 in the Rugby East. Life University beat Army and they open up 1-0. Here, then, are the current Rugby East standings:
| Rugby East | W | L | T | PA | PA | PD | BT | BL | Pts |
| Navy | 1 | 0 | 0 | 65 | 3 | 62 | 1 | 0 | 5 |
| Life | 1 | 0 | 0 | 35 | 7 | 28 | 1 | 0 | 5 |
| Mount St. Mary's | 1 | 0 | 0 | 33 | 20 | 13 | 1 | 0 | 5 |
| Army | 0 | 1 | 0 | 7 | 35 | -28 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Mary Washington | 0 | 1 | 0 | 23 | 98 | -75 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Penn State | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Please note that Southern Virginia is not being counted in the standings as they are doing a full program reboot and will be playing development games.
