Two titans of the Southeast Collegiate Rugby Conference clash in week five of Friday Night Rugby, as defending national champion and No. 1 Kentucky hosts fifth-ranked Tennessee in Lexington, KY Friday. The Wildcats and Volunteers finished first and second in the SCRC last year, respectively, and are expected contenders once more.
Kentucky enters the contest unbeaten, scooping up wins over Division I Illinois and Marian before opening conference play with a victory over the Crimson Tide in Tuscaloosa, AL. The Marian win was especially sweet, as it avenged Kentucky’s only loss from last season.
The Vols opened with an even more difficult early slate, playing four Division I opponents and Texas A&M on the trot leading into SCRC play, including three varsity sides. Tennessee went 0-2-1 against the latter, losing handily to Queens and by a single try to Thomas More, while drawing with Rio Grande. The Vols then ran away from the Aggies, 46-17, before falling to Ohio State.
The target is squarely on Kentucky’s back this season, as the Wildcats return the bulk of their conference and national championship roster, including a pair of All-Americans in flyhalf Jack Phillips and flanker Holden Hahn.
“The mentality is different. We’re not the ones chasing greatness. We’re the ones being chased, and it changes the approach a little,” said Kentucky head coach Sam Enari. “The focus is pretty high. I think our athletic ceiling is higher this year, but we graduated some key guys with good rugby IQ, so we’re still finding our way.”
Kentucky is coming into the crucial conference match after a bye week, which helped some key Wildcats return from injury, including starting No. 8 Everett Marret, who will make his season debut against Tennessee.
The Vols will be without their booming back rower in No. 8 Matthew Beacom, who scored three tries in the A&M win before suffering an injury in last week’s loss to the Buckeyes. Otherwise, the Vols are relatively healthy on the back end of a grueling five week stretch. Look for Roman Funkhouser, who’ll slide over to No. 8 from blindside flanker, and prop Brendan Bibb to make up for some of Beacom’s missed hard yards.
“Thankfully no traumatic injuries at all. A few boys are banged up, but I think it’s going to make us a lot more physical in the long run, and the speed of play is good,” said Tennessee coach Scott Tungay.
“We really want to build our program to be one of the best state school programs in the East. So we wanted to put it out there and see if we could hang with some of these teams, and see what it would be like if we went DI. So we kind of put the challenge out there to the rest of the SCRC, let’s go fetch some harder competition this year and see if we can push our speed of play or physicality. It’s been good for us.”
Helping the Vols play on the front foot is junior flyhalf Brendan O’Neill, who has a nose for 50/22s. A product of the heralded Aspetuck Valley high school club in Connecticut, O’Neill spent his freshman season at Nazareth before transferring to Knoxville. Lock Hudson Schutte followed from Nazareth this fall, and the native Minnesotan is fitting in well in the Volunteer engine room.
“This year I would say we’re a lot more stable in terms of squad depth. And we’re striving to be more consistent,” said Tungay.
“I still think Kentucky is the team to chase. Big area for us is trying to clean up errors and penalties. We’re still searching for that level of consistency we want to be able to dictate our own game.”
Stream this match live on The Rugby Network.
