Playing with the wind or against it, Central Washington seems to have the run of the breeze Saturday in their opening round Varsity Cup clash with UCLA.

Playing into the wind in the first half, the Wildcats led early thanks to a try from Darren Cooper, but UCLA made it a 5-3 score with a penalty kick from scrumhalf Yoh Nakayama. Korbin Lindell then scored to make it 10-3 before Seb Sharpe touched down UCLA’s first try, and Nakayama kicked the conversion to tie the game up.

Kicking into the wind, CWU would be forgiven for being a little conservative on restarts, but not so this time, as Ian Wright lofted the kick high and somehow no one from UCLA got a hand on it. The rugby ball is a funny shape, and it bounced and rolled downfield, and into in-goal. On his horse was Dominic Lindstrom, who raced in to touch the ball down.

“It was a big play for us,” said CWU Head Coach Tony Pacheco. “It got us in a position where we knew we could attack them, and with the wind we could use our kicking game even more. Ian Wright had a great game kicking.”

In the second half, with the wind at their backs, the Wildcats exploded for three tries in the space of seven minutes, paced by a nifty counter-attack from Lindstrom, and another when newly-minted USA 7s player Seth Halliman sliced through the Bruin defense and set up Wright. then it was the turn of Tanner Barnes, who capped off a set move from the lineout, and a 15-10 halftime score was, at 51 minutes, 32-10.

Clint Lemkus for CWU, then Luke Hoffman for UCLA, and finally John Hayden for Central capped off the scoring. But most will remember that restart that sailed and bounced into big trouble for the Bruins.

“UCLA is a very good team,” said Pacheco, whose own Wildcats seemed to hit them hard nonetheless. “We just had a bunch of good performances. But it was very close at halftime.”

Now CWU looks ahead to Utah, and Pacheco said that will not be an easy time.

“I don’t know if it’s cultural within the team, or the kinds of players they get, but Utah just plays 100% all the way through, as much as any team,” said the CWU coach. “They just don’t stop competing, no matter what the circumstances. It will be a tough game for us.”