Americans hold on at the end to post historic win
It’s the moment that sports are made for.
With 80 minutes in the books, the game came down to one final sequence.
The crowd pounded and screamed “U-S-A” as the Scots, just a few yards from the go-ahead score, bludgeoned the American defensive line.
Bodies dropped, faces sopped, but at the end the Scots finally had their way, spreading their attack wide and just barely scoring at the far left pylon. They still trailed by one, but wing Blair Kinghorn had a chance to win on the two-point conversion kick from a steep angle.
To the crowd’s exuberance, he missed as the United States took a huge step Saturday night, upsetting No. 6 Scotland in dramatic fashion 30-29 at BBVA Compass Stadium, giving the U.S. its first win over a Tier One nation — rugby’s major powers.
The win took 94 years to achieve but comes a year out from the next Rugby World Cup in Japan in which the Americans are in the same tough pool as England, France, Argentina and Tonga.
“Credit to our pack for an unbelievable performance because the reality is it’s the boys up front who determine who wins test matches. How deep can they go?” U.S. captain Blaine Scully said. “It’s not an accident that we defended that well, we trained that. We trained being under that much pressure.”
Not even a minute into the game, Scottish fullback and captain Stuart Hogg turned the corner as Scotland spread the ball wide to beat the Americans to the edge. Hogg burst through the open space, floating a lateral to Kinghorn, who outpaced the Americans down the side for the score.
A series of penalties deflated American opportunities early, but in the 14th minute a high tackle infraction on the Scots allowed American fly half AJ MacGinty to trim the lead to four after slotting the three-point penalty.
Scotland starts strong
About 10 minutes later, well into the United States’ half, Scottish inside center Pete Horne pirouetted away from one defender and quickly offloaded to scrum-half George Horne — his teammate on Scottish club Glasgow Warriors and a first-time starter. The scrum-half darted forward and crashed into the defense at the try line, breaking the plane for another try (similar to a touchdown, worth five points plus two for the conversion).
After MacGinty added three following another penalty, Scotland led 14-6.
With momentum seemingly swinging in the Americans favor, Scotland sought to impose its will.
They did after a 34th minute lineout from about five yards out from the try line. Spearheaded by hooker George Turner, Scotland mauled the Americans into the try zone to stretch the lead to 21-6.
With the match slipping away, American scrumhalf Shaun Davies raised his arms, urging the crowd into the game. The crowd might not have immediately responded but his teammates did, stripping possession away on the ensuing kickoff then promptly stringing a sequence of positive plays together.
They chipped at Scotland’s wall until hooker Joe Taufete’e slammed into a defender then dipped his shoulder to spin away and nosedive for the try. The Americans nearly escaped the half with momentum leaning their way but a penalty allowed Scotland take a 24-13 advantage at the break.
U.S. dominates 2nd half
“This group here want to go places and they want to keep improving and I don’t think I had to say anything at halftime,” U.S. coach Gary Gold said. “This group had a lot of confidence after scoring that try just before halftime and felt, hey, we can go toeto-toe here.”
The Americans dominated the second half.
Minutes into the period Taufete’e detached from the pack and bulldozed his way through the defense. MacGinty stayed true with another penalty to cut the margin to 24-23.
“I know you’re not really going to believe this is the truth, but winning or losing today wasn’t the priority,” Gold said. “Wanting to see how far we can progress when we start playing against world-class competition was.”
Later in the half, the crowd grew impatient as the respective fullbacks batted punts between each other. But they were rewarded for the wait when Scotland’s Matt Fagerson fumbled the kick.
MacGinty scooped the ball then tossed a pass to Austin Elite flanker Hanco Germishuy who coasted for an easy sliding try to take the 30-24 lead. The U.S., winners of seven in a row, is ranked No. 15.
“The character shown by this group of players was absolutely immense,” Gold said. “I’m really, really happy and satisfied that you can see that we can go toe-to-toe with world-class teams; the issue now obviously is that we have to do it consistently.”