Here is an account of the Saturday’s match featuring our Premier women against SFU from coach Walt Brandl….
Immediately upon kick-off on Saturday it became obvious that the Burnaby Lake Premier Women had benefited either from the previous week’s bye or from the absence of their Head Coach who had been away on a business trip all week. Burnaby Lake found gaps in the SFU defense and recycled the ball efficiently. The pressure was not rewarded until 20 minutes into the half when a driving maul ended with D’Alice Marsh touching down for the try. Julia Sugawara converted from a tough angle and Burnaby was up 7-0. Although SFU looked dangerous every time they had possession of the ball, Burnaby’s ball winning denied the Clan any opportunity to build any momentum. SFU managed a penalty after a series of deep kicks put them in Burnaby’s end. At the half Burnaby Lake had only a 7-3 lead despite dominating for 40 minutes. Showing no signs of frustration for the lack of payback on their investment of effort Burnaby continued with more of the same in the second half. Fly-half Sabrina Neufeld directed a varied, creative attack to keep the SFU defense from getting set and Emma Hadfield maintained withering pressure on the SFU scrum half by continually victimizing her on slow delivery by the SFU forwards. 10 minutes into the second stanza Julia Sugawara punished the SFU defense for flaring out on defense without contesting the ball at the tackle and took the ball straight over the tackle area and 30 metres to the end zone. Once again the convert was struck flawlessly and Burnaby appeared to have some breathing room at 14-3. SFU looked to be fading when the referee decided to punish Burnaby’s Mandy Lewis for the sins of others by yellow carding her for a high tackle. Although it was Mandy’s first offense and not of a flagrant nature, previous hits by both teams had been getting high so an example was made. SFU was energized by the man advantage and, aided by some lax discipline on the part of Burnaby defenders in terms of respecting the offside line, eventually turned the manpower advantage into a converted try just before Ms. Lewis was released from incarceration. While the sideline crowd wrung their hands at the prospect of letting the victory slips away, the Burnaby team re-grouped and within 5 minutes had worked the ball downfield until Emma Hadfield found herself on a deserted blind-side to deliver the coup-de-grace. Julia once more converted and the game ended 21-10.
The win puts Burnaby Lake in a tie with Capilano for second place and leaves SFU in 4th with little hope of catching either team in front of them. The Burnaby Lake Women followed an impressive on-field display with an equally impressive display at Ladies’ Night in preparation for next week’s trip to the Island to challenge 1st place Nanaimo.
