Gregory Stevenson ’04 is one of the 24 Colgate rugby players who toured Ireland. The senior provided updates via e-mail as he and his teammates competed in games and toured the country.
The team arrived in Ireland on Saturday, March 13. They stayed in Limerick and Galway on the west coast, before traveling to the capital city of Dublin. They played three matches, winning one and losing two, and watched a few others.
According to Greg, the trip was an invaluable experience for the players, both on and off the rugby pitch. They played some top-notch competition and came away a better team for it. They saw some incredible scenery and historic sites, met some great people at the hostels they stayed in, and were overwhelmed by Irish hospitality.
The players were proud of how they organized much of the trip, working closely with college administrators and alumni, who provided a great deal of support. Greg urges other student groups to consider new and innovative approaches to what they do, saying anything is possible at Colgate.
Here are Greg’s dispatches:
Day Nine Sunday
Our coach bus picked us up at 6:30 a.m., and we headed to Dublin International Airport. We happened to be on the same plane as the West Point Rugby team, which also was on a tour of Ireland (They had one game canceled and lost the other). After a long flight and a long drive back to Colgate, we all went our separate ways after meeting up at Curtis, shaking hands, and saying jokingly that we didn’t want to see each other for at least a week. We have a full schedule coming up, however, with games practically every weekend this spring, so we will start practicing as soon as the field is semi-dry.
It was sad for the tour to end, yet I felt as if our job was done, and we had successfully completed what we had set out to do. When this endeavor began about eight months ago, I didn’t actually think it would happen. And here it was, ending already, too soon. It was time for me to get back to looking for a job, getting my schoolwork done, and putting out five more issues of the Maroon-News.
I think beyond the fun that we had, the most important thing that every one of us got out of our tour to Ireland was a feeling of accomplishment and pride for what we had done. It wasn’t easy organizing the trip. But it is amazing how working for something like this makes you enjoy the experience so much more, especially since the trip was organized for the most part by students, with help from Coach Burdick, Recreational Sports, and the Colgate administration. It is amazing, as well, to see how much an organization’s alumni can help students achieve great things. Without the help of our alumni, this trip wouldn’t have been possible. We thank them most of all, and will be in contact with them about future events. We are hoping to schedule an alumni game for next year, among other things.
I learned that a student organization doesn’t have to do exactly what they did the year before, that the intelligent molding of old traditions with new ideas keeps a group healthy and vibrant, and most of all, that there is no limit to what a student organization can achieve. I hope all of the student groups at Colgate can learn such a lesson, because the 24 of us who went to Ireland are so much more the better for it.
Day Eight Saturday
Saturday was our last full day in Ireland, and it was perhaps the most memorable of the trip. We woke up at about 10, had breakfast, and started walking toward Landsdowne Road, where Ireland was hosting Italy in a Six Nations match. After walking across town, and seeing tons of Irish, Americans, and Italians decked out in their rugby gear headed for the stadium, we finally arrived at the most hallowed rugby pitch in Ireland. We had a bite to eat at a local supermarket, and when the gates opened at noon, Peter Devaney-Graham ’07, Coach Burdick and I were a few of the first people into the south terrace – standing room only.
It is amazing how the stadiums in this country – and probably across Europe – are mostly standing room only arenas. Not that any of us would have sat down, anyway. We were too excited. The weather was terrible. Newspapers the next day would call it some of the worst weather ever for a Six Nations match.
Perhaps the best part of the match, besides seeing Ireland prevail, 19-6, was to hear the entire crowd singing Irish folk songs together throughout the game. They weren’t prompted by any sound system blaring “Who Let The Dogs Out,” but instead sang out on their own with a tear-jerking rendition of “The Fields of Athenry.” After 80 minutes of fantastically entertaining rugby and song, 45,000 people left the stadium and started walking towards downtown Dublin to celebrate and to watch the England-Wales match.
After splitting up to eat dinner, everybody went back to the hostel to pack. We were leaving for home the next morning at 6:30, so we spent the night getting ready and playing poker in the hostel common area. Everyone seemed a bit sad, a bit tired, but a bit ready to head back home.
Day Seven Friday
It was emotional out on the pitch today. It was our last game on our tour, and for many of us, probably the last international match we would ever play in. We played the Dublin City University Rugby Club, which is a genuine college team everyone on the pitch was our age, although much more experienced. We played well against them, despite the loss of a few of our starters, including team captain Joe Martin ’04. All of our players left everytching on the field, and it showed. Despite a loss to DCU, we had a good performance, scoring 31 points to DCU’s 55. It was an offensive battle, with most of our points coming in the second half.
It was sad to walk off the pitch for the last time. We had worked so hard for this, and now it was over. But I enjoyed every minute of it. I enjoyed coming together as a team, working for our common goal, and achieving more than we could have dreamed. This week will go down as one of the best in all of our college careers.
The Dublin boys showed us a good time, inviting us to the DCU Student Union to have a bite to eat and share stories. One of the guys named Paul came back to the hostel with us, waited for us to get changed out of our No. 1s, and led us to a great dance club downtown, where we all danced the night away.
Tomorrow is our last day in Ireland, and we will be watching the Ireland-Italy match. This trip has been all I could have wanted so far, and it’s truly a shame for it to end.
Day Six Thursday
Today was another travel day, as we worked our way across the country to Dublin. We arrived in the capital, checked into our rooms and split up, most of us going to the Guinness Brewery tour, while Matt Olson ’04 and others went to see the Book of Kells at Trinity College.
The entire team, tired after the trip, spent the evening in the hostel, meeting the other travelers there, playing pool and watching movies on TV. We needed our rest, with our third and final game coming up the next day.
Day Five Wednesday
We arrived in Galway, and checked in to a hostel right next to Eyre Square the center of town. Nine of us followed Jon Berk ’07 into Flanahey’s Pub for dinner, where even more fine Irish food was consumed. Galway is packed with college kids; it’s like a night at the Jug, but spread over 10 square miles, and with 10 times the amount of people. Later in the evening, many of the guys spent a few hours listening to an Irish band at the King’s Head, a three-floor dance club and pub on the most bustling street in Galway, High Street, which has been closed to motor traffic in order to accommodate pedestrians.
Tomorrow we have a game against the Galway Corinthians, so we are turning in early for the night. Eli Pearlman-Storch ’04, Matt Olson ’04, Peter Devaney-Graham ’07, Sean Devlin ’05 and John Roberts ’07 have been playing cards in the hostel common room for hours. The hostel is full of people from all over the world. We’ve met a good group of Americans, and a bunch of Irish art students. Hostels are amazing places, where young people congregate and allow themselves to experience the way others live. There are people sketching, playing cards, reading a book and chatting over a beer. We picked a great spot, in a great city to spend the next two days.
After everyone was roused out of bed at 9:30 a.m., we drove to the University of Limerick again for a training session with Shannon RFC coach Rowan West, who is from New Zealand. While all of us were still quite tired, sore and groggy from the day before, we learned a lot in the hour that Rowan was coaching us. We put in a new defensive strategy for one aspect of the game, which will definitely come in handy against the Galway Corinthians this Wednesday.
We practiced on Astroturf something we weren’t expecting, and some of us weren’t exactly prepared for. Mike Tone played barefoot, Bobby Hite ’06 played in his loafers, and Matt Olson ’04 and Greg Rawson ’04, team captains, were clunking around in their hiking boots.
After practice, we headed to Bunratty Castle, one of Ireland’s many ancient edifices. We walked up the perilous steps to the ramparts, where we could see about 10 feet into the countryside, due to the pouring rain. Most of us took our turn sitting in Earl O’Brien’s throne, and Dave Peters ’05 had an especially good time pretending to be presiding over a feast in the banquet hall.
We spent the rest of the day exploring Limerick on our own, checking out the shopping and sights. We leave for Galway tomorrow morning. The first leg of our trip is almost complete, and already I’m wishing we could stay a few more days.
An Irish breakfast is amazing. It seems that the Irish are experts at cooking things that are greasy, fatty, and therefore, delicious. We boarded our coach bus wearing our No. 1s (khakis, Colgate tie, white shirt, blue blazer), and Josephine, our bus driver, drove us to the University of Limerick.
On the bus, everyone was trying to figure out what the other team would be like, and what they were expecting from us. Joe Martin ’04, one of the captains, insisted that they were expecting us to all be ex-football players who were going to lay bone-crushing hits, and therefore we should try to do that as often as possible. Many of us were expecting them to be the best team we had ever played and that we would be pummeled into the ground by giant Irishmen. Coach Burdick kept insisting, however, that he thought we had a chance.
After changing into our uniforms, we took to the field, took a team picture, and began warming up. Our nerves were obviously a little shaky, as we were dropping the ball constantly and tripping over our own feet as we got ready for the game.
But the game turned out to be perhaps the most fun I had ever had in 80 minutes. Despite hard-fought battles, including a 15 minute try-line defensive stand on our part, we ended the day victorious, scoring a very lucky 13 points to the Bohemians’ seven. Eli Pearlman-Storch ’04 had eight points, with two penalty kicks and a successful conversion after a stunning try by Brice Chaney ’06.
The “man of the match” was proclaimed by Coach Burdick to be every single one of us, and the day was ended with hospitality on the part of the Bohemians, who kept us fed with sandwiches and other refreshments after the game. We exchanged gifts, giving a Colgate tie to the manager of the club, and a Colgate pennant to the team to hang in their clubhouse. We spent time talking with the members of the other team for a few hours, with discussions ranging from rugby to foreign policy.
After returning to the hotel, the members of the team went their separate ways, eating dinner and celebrating our win. Overall, I would say that Sunday was the culmination of everything we had worked for during the past six months.
After months of preparation, hours of practice and lots of help from alumni, we finally landed in Ireland Saturday morning. We arrived at Shannon Airport at 7 a.m. a tired, ugly group, but we had a whole day ahead of us, and we weren’t complaining. We visited the Cliffs of Moher and were met by a cold rain on top of the 700-foot majestic cliffs. The weather wasn’t enough to get us down, however, which was made clear when Bill Hoelzer ‘06 and Brice Chaney ’06 both took off their shirts and screamed from the cliffs.
Just after checking in to our hotel in Limerick, we took a walk to go watch Shannon RFC and the Buccaneers RFC play in an All-Ireland rugby match. Shannon won 9-6, and we learned a lot from watching the two teams, which included players who also compete for the Irish national team.
The game provided some fabulous rugby and a showcase of Irish weather: During the 80-minute match, there was rain, hail, a few sunny spells and a very Irish rainbow framing the pitch. The crowd was colorful as well, with fans from both sides sitting together and cheering not only for their clubs, but also for well-played rugby from both sides.
While walking back to the hotel, Mike Tone ’07, Scott Parkin ’07, and a few other guys stopped to walk around a giant castle that was built in the 1300s. After everyone enjoyed dinner at pubs around the city, most of the group went to bed around 9 p.m., feeling the effects of jet lag. We also wanted to be well rested for our game the next day for the first time ever a Colgate team would be playing rugby against a foreign team, on foreign soil.