This weekend, there will be hard hits, breakaway runs and inches won and lost. Not just inside Beaver Stadium, but on the fields surrounding it as well.

The Penn State women's rugby team takes to the East Campus fields, across the street from Beaver Stadium, for the round of 16 in the Division I Women's Collegiate Rugby Playoffs.

Penn State is hosting the round for pools B and C, made up of a total of eight teams. The winners of each pool will move on to the national semifinals and championship games in California on May 6-7.

The Lady Ruggers' second-place finish in the Mid Atlantic Rugby Football Union (MARFU) tournament three weeks ago earned them the No. 3 overall seed in the round of 16. They will face No. 14-seeded Northern Iowa at 11 a.m. tomorrow, in hopes of advancing to the quarterfinals on Sunday.

The winner of the Penn State and Northern Iowa game will face the Army-Chico State winner on Sunday. The Lady Ruggers have never faced any of the three potential opponents in championship play before.

"[Against a new opponent], we really try to focus on our own game. We need get mentally prepared for the game," Penn State head coach Pete Steinberg said.

Lady Ruggers captain Amber Benlian said the team has worked on specific areas of the game in practice in the previous weeks.

"We have been refining our skills; we haven't changed much of our game plan. We've been working hard to stay strong mentally and physically," she said.

Mental preparation is not the only obstacle the Lady Ruggers are dealing with. One issue is the team's relative match inexperience in the past weeks. The team has not played in a non-scrimmage game since the MARFU championships at the beginning of April.

"We have had a lot of contact in practice, so I don't think it will have a big impact," Steinberg said.

Another issue is staying focused in pressure-packed national tournament games.

"In general we need to stay calm under pressure. We had some issues against Virginia at the MARFU championships when the momentum turned against us; we lost patience. This week there will be times that we will be under pressure and we need to keep our heads," Steinberg said.

If the Lady Ruggers are successful this weekend, they will make their third consecutive semifinal appearance. Penn State won the national title in 2004, and lost in last year's championship match to Stanford, this year's No. 1 overall seed.

"We need to take every step at a time. We have a very successful past and we just try to keep that tradition going," Benlian said.