All eyes are on NIRA's D1 with the two undefeated teams facing off in Cambridge, MA.
Harvard is entering a tough final three weeks of their schedule with Dartmouth, Brown, and Army on the slate. But the big one right now is ... right now. Dartmouth is 4-0, having earned four-try bonus points in each match. The thing is, Harvard has done the same, and leads the conference in points difference by a wide margin.
| NIRA D1 | W | L | T | PF | PA | PD | BT | BL | Pts |
| Harvard | 4 | 0 | 0 | 282 | 27 | 255 | 4 | 0 | 20 |
| Dartmouth | 4 | 0 | 0 | 173 | 28 | 145 | 4 | 0 | 20 |
| Army | 3 | 1 | 0 | 188 | 50 | 138 | 2 | 0 | 14 |
| Brown | 2 | 1 | 1 | 154 | 71 | 83 | 3 | 0 | 13 |
| Sacred Heart | 1 | 2 | 1 | 85 | 101 | -16 | 1 | 0 | 7 |
| Quinnipiac | 1 | 3 | 0 | 96 | 127 | -31 | 1 | 1 | 6 |
| Mount St. Mary's | 0 | 4 | 0 | 10 | 269 | -259 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Princeton | 0 | 4 | 0 | 21 | 325 | -304 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Harvard is paced by yet another excellent season from scrumhalf Cassidy Bargell, and a nice injection of pace and finishing ability from freshman Lennox London, who leads the team with eight tries. This will be the Harvard team's Senior Day with seniors Bargell, Achele Agada, Alex Pipkin, and Michelle Groth behind honored.
Dartmouth has already beaten Army, which was easily their toughest game. They also are getting big performances from experienced players such as Sophia Haley—she is one of five 5th-year seniors, including 2019 MA Sorensen Award-winner Emily Henrich—on the Dartmouth side. Kristin Bitter leads Dartmouth with 38 points on four tries and nine conversions.
Last year these two teams met it was a 45-31 victory for Dartmouth (on Dartmouth's senior day) and that was a weird one in that Dartmouth ran out to a massive lead only to see the second half be very much Harvard's. Certainly both coaches will be wanting to see a bit more defense this time around.
D1 Rematch
Navy is gearing up for its full NIRA membership and so is Davenport, so we're including this game in our preview. The clash between these two is also a rematch of the 2021 CRAA D1 fall final, won in a close one by Navy.
“The team is very excited for what we like to call our business trip to go play Davenport, who is a big rival to us. They always have a good team and are a very good program,” said Navy Head Coach Murph McCarthy. “We recently saw them in the national finals for 7s back in May so we’re looking forward to going to their place and having a great match. We have some younger girls traveling on this trip and I’m excited to see how they’re going to contribute. As always, I’m looking for strong leadership from our captains Eliza Herring and Nicole Deprey.”
