Athlete of the Week: Brown Singlehandedly Outscores Brown

This past Saturday, the Harvard women’s rugby team came away with its first win against Brown in roughly a decade. Although the Bears have commanded the rivalry in the past, this year a different Brown dominated the game.

Crimson co-captain Xanni Brown led her squad with 37 of its 57 points, more than quintupling the seven points that her Providence opponents scored in the entire match.

“It was awesome,” fellow co-captain Brandy Machado said. “Whenever we were near the sidelines, she was there, fighting really hard to score. I was a little bit worried that we wouldn’t be able to hold the lead, but Xanni proved me wrong every single time she scored.”

Brown made sure that Harvard had nothing to worry about on the offensive side of the ball, scoring five tries and adding six conversions in the team’s victory. Although Brown was the top scorer of the game, she attributed her success to the ability to work well with her teammates.

“I thought game management went really well for me this week,” Brown said. “Making sure I was communicating and [making sure I was] on the same page as all my teammates so that we were executing the game plan created a lot of opportunities for me.”

The fact that Brown outscored the entire opposing team may seem like an anomaly to some, but it does not come as a shock to co-captain Ali Haber.

“In general, I’m not surprised when she outscores the other team,” Haber said. “We were really excited to beat Brown because that hasn’t happened in a really long time. [Saturday] was extra exciting because Xanni’s play was phenomenal.”

Phenomenal play is something that has been the standard for Brown throughout the rugby team’s inaugural season as a varsity sport. She leads the Crimson with nine tries on the year and has scored at least one try in all four of the team’s regular season contests, including Harvard’s only score in last weekend’s 10-5 loss at Dartmouth.

Because the Bears have proved to be such a dominant opponent in the past, the Crimson entered the game with extra motivation to prove it belonged in varsity level competition, and Brown stepped up her individual game as well.

“Because we were playing much better as a team, some of those tries she scored [were the result of] a pass right before the try-zone because we were actually playing together,” Haber said. “There was a lot more team play, and she was the aggression at the end that got the ball into the try-zone, but there was a lot of help along the way.”

Being a co-captain of a varsity team may put Brown in the spotlight, but that is a role she willingly steps into. Brown noted that the team has put a lot of effort into elevating its status to a varsity sport. She believes that the squad’s performance in this inaugural season will set the tone for the program.

“There’s pressure [to succeed], but in a good way,” Brown said. “It’s been really surprising to me to see how many people are paying attention to the fact that we’ve made this transition…It’s really exciting to be a part of something that people around here are watching.”

Perhaps surprisingly, this season marks only Brown’s fourth year playing the sport. Entering college with no prior rugby experience, Brown was encouraged by the older members of the team to try rugby as a freshman, and she has not looked back since.

“The girls who were seniors when I was a freshman and led the team to a national championship had a great impact on me,” Brown said. “Now that I am playing that role this year, I try to embody their on-field skill and their leadership off the field.”

Brown’s leadership outside of game play is something that her teammates greatly commend. Being the anchor of the squad both on and off the field allows Brown to showcase her athletic ability while encouraging her teammates to push themselves to improve their play, as well.

“Xanni has always been a leader on the field, but now she is also putting in work as captain, so she is mentally leading the team, as well,” Haber said. “She was a star this week, as always.”