Similarly to last season's game, West Chester came in and shocked the Ruggers with its tough defense and aggressive style of play.
"They were aggressive on defense and tackled really well," Penn State men's rugby coach Terry Ryland said. He added that the Ruggers were not playing physical enough.
A couple of minutes into the second half, West Chester converted a penalty, setting the score at 15-7 in its favor. That was when the Ruggers turned it on.
The Ruggers went on a scoring rampage, scoring 25 unanswered points to win 32-15.
"We were tired and had enough," Ryland said. "We decided to get this over with."
Unfortunately for the Ruggers, in their second game, Navy pounced on them from the start, took the lead and never relinquished it.
"We made a few bad plays, and they got a couple of scores on us," Ryland said.
Navy, a much bigger team, forced the Ruggers into mistakes by being physical and wearing the Ruggers out with its conditioning.
"The mistakes came from fatigue," Ryland said.
Fatigue plus nervousness sealed the Ruggers fate. With relatively little success against Navy, the Ruggers were forcing things, which led to more mistakes.
But not everything was negative for the Ruggers.
For one, they showed they could stand up to the bigger boys by playing tenacious defense and they never gave up.
"I was very pleased with the energy and tenacity we played with," Ryland said. "I hope they believe in themselves, because they showed they have the tenacity. They weren't backing down."
Despite the end score being 33-10, the Ruggers can stand with their head up high.
"I was really pleased with how they stepped up," Ryland said.
He added that he was especially pleased with their defense and defense wins championships.
