MIT hold on for hard fought win

MIT showed their character as a team in their final spring test, bouncing back from last week’s disappointment with a hard earned win on the road against Brooklyn.
After exchanging early tries MIT found their rhythm and scored a couple of unanswered tries, either side of half time. All scored by forwards (Shecter, Steve H and Cody), and all grinded out by patient phased rugby from a tightly knitted pack making key incisions with deft offloads. In defense, Niall on the wing tidied up potentially dangerous loose ball on several occasions and brought it back into contact to reset a ruck for the pack to rebuild. And Dave at out half showed some great handling in dealing with a slippy ball in the wet conditions.

Early in the second half the visitors lead was 21 to 5, but Brooklyn showed why there is very little between these two sides. Having struggled in the first period to contain MIT's rampant pack inside their own half, Brooklyn put their fate in their former international out-half to kick for territory and press. Mike B at full back reacted gallantly in covering a lot of space to react to some very well placed kicks and MIT were able to build counter attacks that, on occasion, got them all the way to the try line only to be denied by uncharacteristic errors. Five meter penalties were squandered and an overlap involving Mike B, Zach and Patrick on the wing failed to deliver on the score you'd expect when three such fine finishers get their hands on the ball.
On the other hand, Brooklyn were able to make the most of their chances when finding touch inside MIT's half and clawed back 14 points to get within 2 of MIT and make the last 15 minutes of the game tense enough to require serious MIT metal not to bend. Both sides made exciting incursions into the others half in that period, but most significantly, the visitors defended a lineout and their line in a final attack to deny Brooklyn a repeat win against MIT. Last year Brooklyn were triumphant by the slenderest of margins with a 1 point win, so this result of 21 to 19 for MIT proves these are two sides that are passionate about rugby and fight to the end for a win.

It’s on to the key stage of MIT's spring season from here when they defend their NERFU cup in Rhode Island on May 19th / 20th, but unfortunately the injury woes continue, losing Brad in the front row on consecutive weeks through neck and shoulder injuries, while the list was further compounded by the addition of Cody who injured his shoulder while showing yet again why he's such an integral part of the team equally dangerous in forcing turnovers in defense and carrying in attack. Additional loss came through the announcement of prop Keith that he was retiring from the game but not before giving a full display of his skills, kicking and scoring conversions for the B team after a dogged display for the A’s.