LANGLEY, B.C. – Playing the Pacific Pride – Canada's National Development Academy – Trinity Western lost 54-3 Saturday afternoon at the Willoughby Community Park Stadium. 

TWU's Matt Willemse (Pietermaritzburg, South Africa) slotted a drop goal from 45 metres out in the 19th minute, but that was the only scoring for the Spartans on the day, as the Pride scored nine tries on route to the win.

The Pride countered with three first half tries – one of which was converted – to give the visitors a 17-3 lead at the break. 

The second half was a bit of a different story, as the Pride scored in the 41st minute and went on to put up a total of 37 points over the final 40 minutes.  

The Pride are now 5-0 in the Coastal Cup, having earned two wins over UBC (42-19 and 78-19) and two wins over Victoria (52-12 and 29-15). TWU is 0-5.

QUOTABLE
Andrew Evans – Director of Rugby
"We wanted the boys to play with violence and they certainly were physical in the first half on defence. They kept the Pride out from scoring inside our 22 a number of times. The determination we saw in the first half on defence was good to see. On attack, we wanted to play in the Pride's territory more. We spoke about using our kicking game to make that happen. I thought Keegan Marengo (Johannesburg, South Africa) and Matt Willemse did an exceptional job of that. That being said, our set piece struggled in the first half, and for most of the game, and we had some challenges defensively where the Pride did score their points in the first half. But at 17-3 at halftime, there were a lot of positives to take away.

"A lot of boys got more minutes today against an exceptional team. We have no easy games in the Coastal Cup. In terms of getting our players experience, they have to come into these intense games and they learn some hard lessons. But we do hours of video analysis and we have exceptional coaches who will break down the tape and help us take learnings out of today. This is how our young players get experience. This is the way we develop rugby players at Trinity Western. You have to be able to make mistakes and learn from them. I'm sure the players will put in the work and respond. We've been able to develop exceptional rugby players through this process. 

"We hate losing, but we are building towards nationals, when we turn these lessons into wins at the right time."

NOTABLE
•    The Spartans are 0-5 so far in the Coastal Cup, including two losses each to UBC and Victoria.
•    The Spartans will host the Canadian University Men's Rugby Championship Nov. 15-19 at Willoughby Community Park Stadium. The tournament will feature eight of the top university teams in Canada as they vie for the national title. 

UP NEXT
TWU and the Pacific Pride play the rematch Oct. 28 at 2:30 p.m. at Starlight Stadium in Langford, B.C.

About Spartan Athletics
As official members of U SPORTS, the Spartans currently compete in 13 sports in the Canada West conference, including women's and men's soccer, volleyball, basketball, hockey, cross country and track & field, as well as women's rugby sevens. TWU also competes as an independent team in men's rugby and disc golf. Since TWU entered U SPORTS in 1999, the Spartans have won 13 U SPORTS team championships and 32 Canada West team championships.

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