Stanford Trudges Through UC Davis
Davis, CA Saturday February 15, 2014
Cold off a missed game with Chico the weekend before, the Stanford Women headed to face UC Davis, and in the end came away with a 19 – 5 victory.
The very physical game started rough for the Cardinal women, who were scored on first by Davis, who missed their conversion. The Stanford women did not bring their usual A-game to the set pieces, losing their first of four offensive scrums, and only succeeding in winning the last of 5 defensive scrums. The Cardinal also only won two of their six offensive lineouts, and managed to win only the first of four defensive line outs. One try was scored by Junior Chelsea Harris, and the conversion by 5th year senior Aly Gleason was good, so the Stanford women exited the half in a two point lead over Davis.
In the second half Stanford showed improvement in some areas, managing to win all of their offensive scrums, but unfortunately they also created nine defensive scrums, none of which they were able to recover. Sadly no improvement was made in the offensive lineout, with two of the three being handed over due to the throw not being straight. Defensively, however there was quite an improvement, with the Stanford women taking the UC Davis ball in all but one of the five lineouts of the half. All in all the Stanford performance resulted in a very close attempt at scoring by Davis, which was thwarted due to good red zone defense, and two more tries, from rookie freshman Madda Wilson. Aly Gleason was good for one of the two conversions. Stanford ended the game at 19-5.
While Stanford was able to grind out the win, players were not completely satisfied with the team’s performance.
The second game of the day was a solid performance by all, which ended with a score of 33-10. Many of Stanford’s rookies had strong performances, including number 9 Esther Melton, who put up points.
Next Up:Stanford takes on the Cal bears once again for Big Game round 2, this time at home at Steuber Stadium