Queen’s Women’s Rugby opened the U SPORTS Championship at Nixon Field in Kingston, Ont., with an exciting victory.
The Gaels, playing in the last quarterfinal of the opening day of the tournament Wednesday, defeated the British Columbia Thunderbirds 33-26.
With the win, Queen’s advanced to the semifinals, where they will take on the Laval Rouge et Or, who defeated the Acadia Axewomen earlier in the day 46-12.
Ottawa and Victoria won the other quarter-final match-ups. The Gee Gees beat St. Francis Xavier 40-12 and the Vikes knocked off the Guelph Gryphons 21-10.
Last night in front of a packed crowd on the Queen’s campus, Bridget Peros broke the deadlock for the Gaels with the game-winning try in the 64th minute.
“It was such a gritty game,” said Peros, a fifth year senior from Oakville.
She credits Sophie de Goede with the game-winning points.
“It was an incredible run by Sophie,” added Peros.
“She did all the work with a powerful run. At the last second, she passed it off to me and I just took it in for the score. I’m glad they gave Sophie the most valuable player award. She’s the best university player in Canada.”
de Goede, a fifth year senior from Victoria, B.C., said the Thunderbirds, the Canada-West champions gave the Gaels all they could handle.
“We knew it was going to be a tough game and that’s exactly what it was,” added de Goede, who played professional rugby last season in France when U-Sport cancelled the season because of COVID-19.
“It was a grind right down to the final whistle but we pulled out and now get a shot at playing Laval. They beat us for the gold medal in 2019 and now we get a shot at redemption.”
The semi-finals on Friday will start at 5 p.m. with Victoria playing Ottawa. The Gaels tackle Laval at 7.30 p.m.
The two winners will play for the U-Sport gold medal on Sunday afternoon at 3.30 p.m.
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