The aged game of rugby
“This is it. This is the shed,” said rugby player David Sackstein ’14, taping his knee inside the metal facility, about the size of what you’d expect in someone’s back yard. “This is the clubhouse, locker room, weight room,” he said, gesturing, before racing away to join his teammates for practice. It’s a sparkling April day. The team splits off into squadrons across Cumnock IIII, a grassy division adjacent to the Jordan field hockey grounds, all manicured and outfitted with lush Astroturf, unlike Cumnock. Cumnock is dirty. “There’s a real geese problem,” said rugby co-captain and blindside flanker Connor Heard ’12. Behind him, his teammates scrimmaged and practiced lifts, sprinting, and falling to do push-ups on ground sullied with geese droppings and mud. Nearby, there’s a plastic coyote to ward off animals, a makeshift mascot perennially frozen in mid-howl. Between the shed, the swampy conditions, and the coyote, there’s an odd beauty that perfectly...