The Rugby Northeast Conference is is coming down to the wire with four teams chasing 1st place.

Bentley had a bye and stays at 4-0, but now they are tied with Providence College, which defeated Bryant 39-24 to join Bentley at 4-0. 

Meanwhile, Southern Connecticut slammed Stonehill 65-0 to move to 3-1, while also winning was UMass-Lowell, which edged Roger Williams 32-26.

Lowell started the season with a 17-3 loss to Bentley, but since then has rebounded with three straight wins.

But it hasn’t been all smooth sailing, and wasn’t on Saturday, as they saw a 32-5 lead fritter away to a 32-26 scoreline.

The early start to the season caught Lowell not quite firing when they met Bentley, and it hurt them. But now, things are going better.

“We're executing better in the lineouts, which hurt us during that loss, and have really worked on our structure, fitness, and tackling on the front foot,” said Lowell Coach Josh Skinner, who blamed his own game management for the Roger Williams comeback on Saturday - saying he ran all the subs onto the field at once.

“Nick Mogren, who moved from hooker to loose forward, is playing superbly.

“He's everywhere, running good lines and causing havoc at the breakdown,” said Skinner. 

Willy Weinhold scored ten tries in the last three games and leads the conference in tries.

Meanwhile, Providence College got a strong game from flyhallf Matthew Raffoul and beat Bryant 39-24.

“From the first week, before kicking off against Fairfield University, we have dedicated ourselves to Nationals and to the overall success of the program,” said No. 8 and co-captain Tadas Jalinskas. “Coming into the season we knew we had a very strong senior class, but our success has come from a lot of promising young players that have stepped into starting roles.”

The veterans, though, continue to log solid performances, with co-captain and scrumhalf Cameron Hughes, Jalinskas, Raffoul, and flanker Conor Adler playing especially well.

Rugby Northeast has just the one automatic playoff spot, and the conference doesn’t hold an internal playoff, meaning that Lowell and SoConn will need Bentley and Providence to lose a game to have a shot at an automatic bid.

But there’s reason to believe they could campaign for an at-large bid for the second-place team. NECRC, WIIL, Southern Conference, Capital (no longer in existence) and Northern Lights all had runners-up get play-ins in the national playoffs.

“I don't see Bentley slipping up, which means whoever places second in our conference would need to apply for a play-in game,” said Skinner. “If we can make it to that point, I'd like to see how we can perform at the national level.  But, first we need to worry about teams like Providence College and Southern Connecticut, who are both playing at a high level right now as well.”

So it comes down to the next few weeks. Bentley finishes the season with games against SoConn on October 30 and Providence on November 4. Lowell plays SoConn on October 23 and then Providence on October 30. Those four games will decide who wins the conference, and who gets to make some noise about a play-in.