THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, November 2, 1994 TAG: 9411020612
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C4 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY SARAH MISKIN, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Short : 46 lines
Jim and Lorna Murphy's worst nightmare came true a couple of years ago: Their daughter, Joanna, called them from Radford to tell them she had joined the college rugby team.
``She's only 105 pounds,'' Lorna Murphy said as she watched her daughter dragged down by a tackle.
``It looks so rough out there, I wish they had more padding,'' she lamented as her husband muttered about keeping up insurance payments.
A member of another women's team wandered by wearing a T-shirt proclaiming: ``It's a rugby thing: you wouldn't understand.''
Most parents don't. Neither do their friends. Or most guys. But that hasn't stopped women's rugby from forging ahead in the last few years.
Eight teams, including one from Old Dominion, contested the Sandy Lee Cup at the Virginia Rugby Union's state championships.
Although male players like to describe women's rugby as a ``slow motion'' version of the men's game, it is often more sophisticated with less reliance on brute strength.
``It's the most physically challenging of all the sports I've tried,'' said Laurie Early, who plays eight-man for ODU, which finished last in the tournament.
But perhaps the biggest challenge is dealing with the reaction to being a woman rugger. ``It's seen as a freak show,'' said Courtney Gardner, who plays prop for the University of Virginia team.
Women teams get early kickoff times - like at the ungodly hour of 9 a.m.
A referee once told the U.Va. team ``Don't get your jerseys dirty.'' And inevitably there are claims that the women must be lesbians to play such a ``rough'' sport. The players say ask their boyfriends.
``It is a shame that an aggressive woman who likes to challenge herself athletically gets stereotyped in this way,'' said Gardner, who played in three games thisweekend.
After the victorious but exhausted James Madison University team came off the field, many players put on T-shirts that said, ``Rugby, It's A Way of Life.''
For these women it is. by CNB