by The Cowl Editor on September 12, 2019
Friar Sports
By Scott Jarosz ’21
Sports Staff
The Providence College Men’s Rugby Team started its season off on the right foot against the College of the Holy Cross on Friday, September 6. PC was firing on all cylinders in the 37-22 defeat of the talented Crusaders. The team hopes their strong performance is a sign of what is to come in the new season.
Despite a less than stellar record of 2-5 last season, the team showed few signs of struggle in its home opener for the 2019 fall season.
Joe Bentley ’21 got PC off to a hot start under the lights on Friday night as he scored a try early on to make the score 5-0. The team continued to build on that early momentum as it scored again to increase its lead to 12-0 over the visitors.
However, Holy Cross refused to allow PC to control the game and answered back shortly after. The visiting team scored back-to-back tries to cut PC’s lead to 12-10. But the home side managed to bounce back and added another try to make the score 17-10 heading into halftime.
PC did not lose this momentum coming out of the half and made sure that the lead stayed in their hands. The team outscored the visiting side by a score of 20-7 in the second half.
There were a number of key contributing players for PC in the second half including Alex Feola ’22 and Anthony Lancia ’22. Feola scored two tries while Lancia added one try.
PC’s dominant performance against Holy Cross could be a sign of what is to come for the team in this new season. Not only did the veterans of the team contribute, such as Bentley, but younger players such as Feola and Lancia also made their mark and helped the team secure a victory over a talented opponent.
If the team can consistently get contributions from both veterans and younger players throughout the season, there is good reason to believe that they will continue to have success for the remainder of the season.
Bentley is one of the more experienced players on the team. He has been a forward since his freshman year.
When asked what he believes the strengths of this year’s team are, Bentley said, “I definitely think our strengths are our new strong forwards and our fast backs.”
He continued, “Over the summer, we trained the hardest we have since I’ve been playing for this team.”
Bentley emphasized the amount of training that everyone on the team put in over the offseason. He believes this is what is truly going to allow this team to have one of its most successful seasons in a long time.
When asked what he believes the team needs to do in order to have the most successful season possible, he responded, “We need to focus on the system that our coach has set up for us and not stray from it.”
With plenty of new talent and the high level of training that the team put in over the offseason, the Black Pack is looking forward to a promising season.