October 10, 2016
AIC Rugby Rolls By Northeastern
American International College Men’s Rugby Release: Rob Guiry
AIC 37-7 Northeastern
Before the game, 10 seniors were honored in what will be their last home match of the season. All week we talked about getting on the board fast and were able to do so as Jihad Khabir went in for a long try early. Nic Franklyn, sophomore, took the next two to the house, the first of which he really showed a second burst to fly past the opposing backs. Northeastern then scored a weird try. The NU player kicked the ball into the try zone from about the 22, which was corralled and touched down by an AIC player, but went unseen. The ball squeaked out of a pile and was jumped on by NU’s wing. Try called. Crossover athlete Khyheem Finley, making the transition from football to rugby as a senior put in his first career A-side try. Christian Adams then scored the next two, one of which was off a beautifully placed kick into space by scrum half Kurtis Werner. Simple kick and chase there. Finally Matty Jones, never to be left off the scoreboard put one in at the 50 mark. At that point, we kind of took the foot off the gas pedal and pulled the starters that we could. We have a match against a physical UMass team on only 3 days rest so I wanted to get key players out as soon as possible. Overall we got the W, stayed healthy, and are well prepared to finish our conference season out strong.
“Today we played down to our competition and squeezed by on pure athleticism. We had a good week of practice, but didn’t turn on that switch come game time. We have to wake up quick though cause we have a short week and UMass is waiting.” – Jihad Khabir
“In a game where the ball was constantly sloppy, the forwards really stepped up and played smart, heads up rugby. Northeastern, like every other team before them, knew about the dangers our back line presents, and shot up hard to keep them from moving the ball wide. Forwards had to step up.” – Blake Gurgul
AIC
Jihad Khabir 6′
Nic Franklyn x2 20′ 26′
Khyheem Finley 37′
Christian Adams x2 44′ 55′
Matthew Jones 50′
Conversions
Jihad Khabir – 50″
NE
11 (Berrigan) Try – 30′
Converted by 10 (Chan)
