Biarritz, France March 2-12, 2023
The team returned to the tradition of traveling overseas for spring break and departed on May 2nd for the Basque region of France, known for its amazing rugby culture.
The Nittany Lions landed in Paris and had an hour or two in the gardens of Luxembourg palace before catching the train to Biarritz, France. While in Biarritz the team had the opportunity to watch the Biarritz vs Massy mens professional match, enjoy some cold water immersion post training and train and play against local Women's team FAR women.
The match against FAR women was some of the best and fastest rugby the team played all year, with exciting, very french, off loading, hard running and phases of dominant defense. In the end the team struggled to adjust to the new law variations being trialed in France at the amateur level. Those law variations included, waist height tackles, no double tackles and no driving in the scrum after the ball is won. FAR Women had the lead going into halftime 26-19 but the Nittany lions quickly evened the score 26-26 after kick off. Unfortunately as the game moved into the last 20 minutes FAR women scored 3 unanswered tries taking the game 41-26.
Before heading back to Paris to round out the competition the team took some time to explore San Sebastian, Spain on an off day.
On arrival in Paris the team took on RCP 15 in a rainy game under the lights and led 7-5 until the very last minute of the game when RCP dotted down and converted a try taking the game 7-12.
Overall the trip to France opened players eyes to where rugby can take them globally and how rugby is looked at in different parts of the world. It also illustrated that the culture that surrounds rugby and the support it receives across communities is unique among sports. Memories and friendship were created that will hopefully last a lifetime and fuel the team going into the 7s championship season.