Playing under blue skies for one of the few times this season, the rugby club opened its home schedule Saturday with a 16-10 victory over South Pittsburgh.

Although Penn State dominated much of the game, it took a try by Howard Goldfine late in the second half to put the game away. South Pittsburgh was held deep in its own territory through the first half, but the Ruggers were only able to manage a Matt Norton dropkick and a 3-0 lead at the intermission.

The team kept applying pressure in the second half, and Mike Cranston broke through the South Pittsburgh defense for a try after a long struggle near the end-line. A Norton conversion upped the Ruggers' lead to 9-0, and it looked like Penn State would cruise to an easy win.

But South Pittsburgh answered with a try of its own to cut the team's lead to 9-4. A 35-meter penalty kick by Norton pushed Penn State's lead to 12-4, but another South Pittsburgh try narrowed the gap to 12-10.

With time running out the Ruggers took control and forced the ball down to the end-line. South Pittsburgh stopped the Penn State advance just short of the line, but a few seconds later Goldfine popped through a small opening in the South Pittsburgh defense for the try that sealed the victory for Penn State.

"Someone else might could've scored, but I just happened to be the one around the ball at the end," Goldfine said. "We just stuck together as a team and had a total team effort."

The team showed some early season rust, but Coach Bruce Hale didn't see any problems that a month or so of hard work won't cure.

"I thought we played reasonably well, but we still have a lot of work to do on conditioning, and on motivation," Hale said. "We played well in the first half, but in the second half they let down after they scored and took it easy and the other team came on strong. We let them back in the game. We also have a lot of work to do on tackling. We were waiting for them to run to us instead of going to them.

"It's coming, but slowly. It was a step in the right direction, but we still have a lot of work to do."

"We dominated the game except for two 10-minute stretches, one in each half," senior John Walton said. "They were a good team, but I thought we played the better game. We have to bring it together as a team. We let down for a couple of spurts."

The club's B team also dominated South Pittsburgh, but unlike their teammates the B players had no trouble getting into the try-zone, crushing the South Pittsburgh B squad, 30-4.

Scott Davis opened the scoring with a dropkick, and Steve Hayner added a try a few minutes later to push the Ruggers' lead to 9-0. South Pittsburgh answered with a try of their own, but that's when the floodgates opened for Penn State.

Alex DeVicaris got the ball across after a long struggle near the South Pittsburgh line to up the team's lead to 14-4, and Mike Bright followed that with another score.

South Pittsburgh crumbled after that, as both Bright and Lance Polcyn raced through the heart of the South Pittsburgh defense for scores. Davis connected on his fourth conversion of the day, mercifully ending the scoring.

Hale has been looking at players on both the A and B teams to see who will fill the starting spots come tournament time, and he got a good look at his second squad yesterday.

"I thought the B side (team) played as well as the A side, and there are a lot of players on the B side who could play on the A side," Hale said. "I think there should be some very good intersquad competition over the next few weeks.

Many of the team's new players got their first taste of rugby in the third game of the afternoon, and as could be expected there were a few mistakes made.

"The C side played O.K. for the first time," Hale said. "They really don't have a really good idea of what they're supposed to do with every situation, but they played hard, they tackled hard and they ran hard, and I think it was a good experience for them."