SPORTS BRIEFS: Tuesday, April 13, 1999

M. Rugby places fourth in Ivy League Tourney at Dartmouth Sixth-seeded Penn -- a club team -- upset No. 3 Brown 17-9 in their first round game on Saturday but lost to No. 2 Princeton 36-0 later that day. In the third-place game, Penn fell 46-10 to No. 4 Cornell. Against Princeton, two of Penn's top players were lost to injury. Hooker Chris Lindsey was punched in the face by a Tiger player and needed seven stitches. Prop Joseph Mira was also forced out of the game when a Princeton player landed on his right leg, tearing the Penn senior's ACL. "After we lost Mira in the Princeton game our scrums went downhill," Penn captain Mike Slocum said. "We were playing with newer, younger players who hadn't played together." Top-seeded Dartmouth defeated Princeton for the Ivy Tournament championship but most notable in the tournament was the absence of Harvard. The Crimson -- who field the oldest collegiate rugby program in the nation -- were suspended for alcohol-related disciplinary problems. Penn has had its share of troubles this season but none of them were disciplinary. "It's been a difficult season since we lost our field," Penn coach Mike Dugan said. "For years we've practiced at Murphy Field but this year we can't. So we don't have a regular practice field and time and sometimes we only have 50 square yards to practice in." The fourth-place finish was the highest in this tournament for Penn in Dugan's five-year tenure with the club. "This is a lot better than we've done in the past," Slocum said. "We've been doing a lot more work as a team in practice despite the really erratic schedule. People have been doing a lot of work on their own, too." The rugby team will finish its abridged season this Saturday in the Philly Six Tournament -- which features the Big 5 schools plus Drexel -- at Roosevelt Park in South Philadelphia. Penn, which finished third last year in the inaugural year of the tournament, is seeded second, behind only national power Villanova. -- Jason Bodnar Host M. Volleyball loses in semifinals to powerful Princeton This weekend, the Penn men's volleyball team hosted and played in the Ivy League Tournament at the Palestra. Men's volleyball is a club sport for most of the Ivy League, including Penn. The league's two varsity teams, Harvard and Princeton, were also invited, however, and dominated the tournament. Penn advanced from pool play, which was held at Hutchinson Gymnasium, to the semifinals by defeating Yale in two games and Columbia -- the only school that did not send a team by forfeit. Penn's lone loss in pool play came against Princeton; the team then later fell to Harvard in the semifinals. "[The schools with varsity programs] are the ones that ended up being in the finals," Penn sophomore Vinay Singh said. "It's a huge factor but [playing at the Palestra] was something that the team has been waiting for for quite a while, and it was really nice to have the opportunity." The Tigers beat Harvard in the final on Sunday to win the tournament. -- Jesse Spector