Portal:2003 Spring Men/Memorable Events
Coach Holder on the Semi Final match with Berkeley who started some B side players: "By the 20th minute, they quickly substituted in all their top players. I remember when they brought in their Eagle prop off the bench and Hansen fed him his lunch. Later, Hansen told me that he thought the other kid was a better scrummager than the Eagle" Coach Holder goes on to coach the All Americans: http://www.erugbynews.com/goffonrugby/archive/Articles/allamerican052803.htm
Mike McKinney was Final Four tournament MVP.
Wade Dahlgren was co-MVP of the season with Ryan Wilmes.
Josh Dean selected for the Woodley Award, named in honor of American rugby pioneer Albert Woodley, is presented annually to the top collegiate player nationwide. Often referred to as the "Heisman Trophy of rugby," this honor not only recognizes superior athletic performance on the pitch, but also acknowledges outstanding character and leadership displayed both in competition and in life
From Stephen Edstrom, MD
I am a 2003 grad and played rugby between 2000 and 2003, including playing for the Combined Services in the All-American trials in 2001 and 2003. The last match I played as a zoomie was as the hooker in the national championship against Harvard. What amazed me most about the club was the depth of players. We would get 120 guys to a practice and were able to field five sides in five matches on a Saturday with three different clubs. During the playoffs, we would travel with 44 players. We could play 22 guys in the match on Saturday and then play the other 22 on Sunday. This was a wonderful advantage considering that most team we faced would have most of their players play two straight days. When we would take the field on the Sunday with a fresh team and play against guys that were still beat up from the match the day before, it sure made winning a lot easier.
The interesting part about the hookers on the 2003 team is that I was the third best hooker on the team. The best hooker was named Mike Hobson, class of 2005, who ended up playing on the US national team (I remember playing a rugby video game on Play Station that had Mike in the game. The game became a lot more interesting playing with a little video game version of Mike). However, we had enough depth at hooker that we moved Mike to center because he was just that talented and versatile. So during the playoffs, I would switch off playing hooker with Todd Green, class of 2003. I usually played on Saturday and he would play on Sunday, except in the Final Four in which Todd played on Saturday against Cal and then I played against Harvard. It was a fun time to play with the Zoomies, and most of the credit should go to Rob Holder for taking control of the club and really turning the team around.
