AUS Rugby Playoff Preview: UPEI and Acadia battle for berth in AUS final

Axewomen earned 2-0 season series win

HALIFAX, NS. (Oct. 16, 2024) – With uniforms barely dry from their final Atlantic University Sport (AUS) rugby regular season games this past weekend, the UPEI Panthers and Acadia Axewomen will square off tonight in a win-or-go-home semifinal in Wolfville, NS.

The winner will get a date with the 19-time AUS champs – the STFX X-Women – in the AUS Rugby Championship, presented by Bell, on Oct. 23.

The X-Women earned the right to host the AUS Championship by beating Acadia just this past weekend. The loss gave both Acadia and STFX 5-1 records, but the X-Women earned the bye to the final by way of point differential in head-to-head play.

“Clinching first place on Saturday was massive for us. The 10 days off will help us recover and work on our game,” said X-Women head coach, Mike Cavanagh. “We are a confident team, so winning that game only reinforced what we are trying to achieve. We know whoever we play in the final will be a tough game.”

On the other side of that loss was the Axewomen, who were a spotless 5-0 going into their final regular season contest. Head coach Matthew Durant admitted his team was disappointed with the loss but are focused on doing what it takes to force a rematch with STFX – this time with the AUS title on the line.

“Our message has been to stick with what has gotten us to this point,” Durant said. “We let an undefeated season slip away with a poor performance last week, but I think we are set to have a strong performance in the semifinals.”

For UPEI, their season has not gone the way they were hoping. In 2023, the Panthers went 5-1 and hosted the AUS Championship game – a narrow 26-22 loss to STFX they no doubt would like to avenge. This time around the Panthers went just 2-4 and enter tonight’s semifinal as the third seed.

In their two head-to-head matchups this season, Acadia got the best of UPEI on both occasions – a 19-12 decision on Sept. 7, and a 43-14 win on Oct. 5.

UPEI, however, has an ace up their sleeve in that they already have a berth at the 2024 U SPORTS Women’s Rugby Championship locked up as they will host the event Oct. 30 to Nov. 3 in Charlottetown.

Should UPEI go as so far to win the AUS title, the second place X-Women would book a ticket to nationals as the conference representative. Should UPEI lose tonight’s semifinal, it will be the winner of Acadia and STFX in the championship final to see who will travel to PEI to tackle the country’s best.