Down 17-8 at the half, American International College’s forwards surged in the second half, dotting down four tries to overtake Army 32-29. The teams were both looking for their first win within the Northeast's DI Western Division.

At the heart of the AIC comeback was a familiar name, Eagle Jess Davis. The No. 8 is the Yellow Jackets’ all-time leading scorer and added a hat trick to her tally on Saturday.

Ten minutes in, AIC’s Sarah Coucci slotted a penalty for the 3-0 lead. Little did the teams know that those early points would make the difference in the end. Army followed with back-to-back tries, the second of which came from speedy Kate Roose, who was deemed Army Athlete of the Week after her four tries against UCONN the previous weekend. A Carissa Pekny conversion gave the Cadets a 12-3 lead.

At the 28-minute mark, Davis dotted down AIC’s first try (12-8), but Army’s Allison Wilson restored the point margin with her first of two tries. The Cadets went to the locker rooms with a 17-8 lead.

Army’s backs dictated the first half, but the second stanza belonged to the bigger, stronger AIC forwards. In fewer than 15 minutes, the Yellow Jackets pack scored three tries, two from Davis, the other mauled into the try zone. Dominique Cammock added the fourth second-half try, while Coucci tacked on two conversions for the 32-17 lead.

The West Pointers kept it interesting, however, plugging away until the buzzer. With two minutes remaining, both Pekny and Wilson dotted down tries, and Pekny’s game-ending conversion brought the score to 32-29.

“It’s an 80-minute game, not a 40-minute game. If it was, we would have been okay,” Army coach Bill LeClerc told GoArmySports.com. “We started well in the second half but we didn’t finish the opportunities we created. Momentum is a funny thing and it decided to swing the other way, and we just couldn’t do anything to stop it.

“The last three minutes was pleasing to see that we could still come back after basically tanking the first 30 minutes,” LeClerc added. “The girls never stopped trying and there was some positive stuff to take from the game.”

The game marked new head coach Dmitri Efthimiou’s first win with the Yellow Jackets. The former Boston Women coach inaugurated his season with a 58-12 loss to ACRA champion Norwich.

AIC captain Muneera Patton wrote: Coach Efthimiou went back to the drawing board and formulated a new game plan. At practice we expanded our defensive strategies and switched girls around to both new and different positions in hopes of finding the most effective combinations.

AIC is now 1-1 in league, while Army is 0-2. The duo competes against Norwich in the Western Division, while six other DI teams compete in the Eastern Division. Cross-divisional matches do not count toward league standings.