Auburn Rugby Club traveled to Statesboro, Ga., Saturday to compete in the Georgia Rugby Union Tournament.
It played Armstrong Atlantic and Georgia Tech, defeating Armstrong 25-14 and losing to Georgia Tech 0-55.
"It was a good learning experience, but besides that, we had a lot of inexperienced players going," Vice President Michael Strong said. "Considering all, it didn't go very well, but it was good for everyone that went."
Strong said the team of 37 is undefeated in exhibition matches and is 2-5 in tournament game play.
Strong specifically gave praise to one member of the team, Michael Pair, for his efforts over the weekend.
"Michael Pair did a fantastic job," Strong said. "He was the first guy to hit their biggest guy."
Team member Caleb Faruki said teammate Michael Ruple was a big part of the weekend. Faruki said Ruple finished one of the games with a dislocated shoulder.
Strong described his team strategy as wanting to just beat the other team.
"Our strategy is usually a pac-ball kind of thing," Strong said. "We try to beat them into submission. We don't dance around very much, we try to just beat them."
Team member Peter Ehrensperger said it was a decent tournament for the whole team.
"Our first game, we did play a pretty game; we won that game," Ehrensperger said. "We kind of got lazy in the second half, let them come back and score a few. Our second game, we were just tired. They jumped on us early and it was all downhill from there."
Faruki said the tournament was not great in his eyes.
"It's mainly a bad experience for me," Faruki said. "We didn't take this tournament serious as we do take for the ones later on."
Faruki and Ehrensperger said they have rituals they perform before each game.
"I just focus on what I need to do, go over my job in my head and just get ready to do it," Ehrensperger said.
Faruki said he likes to study other rugby games and motivate his teammates.
"I usually watch rugby games online or something like that, listen to music or talk to my team about how we're supposed to play the game," Faruki said.
The team said it is looking forward to a rematch with Georgia Tech over Halloween weekend.
The team is preparing for the Breast Cancer Tournament Saturday in Jacksonville, Fla., and the SEC Tournament Saturday Oct. 24 in Birmingham.
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