Hello Gamecock Rugby Nation,   

Reflecting on the season so far is hard.Starting the season off with a win over Kentucky was a little of a false sense of security. We were surely the better team in the Ky game and exploited their weaknesses. The last two losses are a different story altogether. One we should have won and the other we were soundly beaten by a better team.

The LSU game played in a 35mph wind was a clamity of handling and kicking errors that sealed our loss. LSU picked up 21 points on blocked kicks and dropped passes.The day was not ours to come out on top.One of the LSU tries was a double knock on that the referee did not see, but can't call what you don't see.

We didn't help ourselves with our offense. We had very poor passing and handling day in a tough wind. We missed at least 4 or 5 easy tries if we just held on or gave better passes.Overall we had  poor execution but feel we could have won the game on any other day.

The Tennessee game was another story. They started out controlling the ball from the kick off and controlled most of the loose play and scrums.Overall they did a better job in support and got to the rucks quicker and with more numbers with they bigger forwards. We did a poor job of stopping theirs pod play and pick n go from the base. When we did stop the forwards they were quick to get the ball out to the wings and beat us on the corners.

Based on what we have seen in the league so far, we need to improve our recruiting of some larger forwards  and get the men into the weight room if we want to beat Tenn. I feel we are on even footing with the rest of the league but need to increase the intensity and hone our basic skills where we can eliminate our handling and kicking errors.

Looking forward to taking all 3 teams down to Athens this saturday and see how we measure up with the bulldogs.

Mark Morris
Head Coach