Women’s club rugby president Sara Lundy is looking to create a new tradition for the club.

The women’s rugby team decided that it would have to undergo a change last year. Sticking to the guidelines set in place by the Club Sports organization – which include getting forms in on time, engaging in frequent community service and staying active in the club sports council – has helped one of the more physical club sports make a name for itself. Lundy, a senior in zoology, said after years of being a disorganized group, she and her teammates decided to take matters into their own hands. She estimated the women’s team moved up thirty or so spots in the club sports rankings. ”Last year, we were in the bottom tier, and this year we’ve worked really hard to make sure we’ve gotten every form into club sports on time and as much community service as we could fit into our schedule,” Lundy said. As her predecessors did, Lundy has Mary Yemma, the assistant director for club sports “on speed dial,” and talks to her several times a week. She has four community service projects set up during the first two weeks of school, including helping freshmen move into the dorms. The team has improved on the field as well as from an organizational standpoint. ”We went from winning one or two games a few years ago to four or five last year and beat Elon, a good rugby school, twice,” Lundy said. Last year’s captain, Ashleigh Davis, who graduated in May with degrees in Spanish and international politics but remains active with the club, said squads from nearby schools UNC-Chapel Hill and ECU went to nationals last year — a fact that didn’t sit well with her team. ”With teams so close to us making it to nationals, we’re like, we’re bigger than they are, we should be doing better,” Davis said. “It’s motivation, and we’ve used that to make headway.” Their efforts were partially made in effort to improve recruiting. The club sports fair was removed from New Student Orientation, making it harder for clubs to reach out to campus newcomers. Plus, as Lundy put it, “parents are a little afraid of rugby.” Katie Walls, a sophomore in communication, experienced what the parents may be afraid of this past weekend in Wilmington at the two-day Cape Fear Sevens tournament. The women’s club teamed up with the Raleigh Rugby Club and sent two groups to participate. She broke her finger in the first game of the day and played the rest of the game. In the third and final game of the day, her team ran out of substitution players, so she went in with her finger taped. During that game, she broke it again and dislocated it. As Walls put it, it “could have been worse.”

During her first year with the club, she dislocated her shoulder and injured her knee. ”Rugby’s got that mentality where you do anything for your team,” Walls said. One of State’s and Raleigh Rugby’s hybrid teams did particularly well, making it to the tournament semifinals. The women’s and men’s teams are playing in sevens tournaments, a modified game that involves fewer players. They will participate in another tournament in Raleigh July 18. ”There’s lot more running, a lot more man on man,” Lundy said. “As our coach says, it’s ‘a big game of keep away.’ You’re reading the field better and you’re working on your hands constantly with all the catching and throwing. You can feel yourself improving as a rugby player while you’re playing.”