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Too big, too strong, too good.

The St. Francis Xavier

X-Women bludgeoned their

way into the semifinals of the

U Sports national women’s

rugby championship at Acadia, rucking over Queen’s 42-21 on Thursday.

The Gaels had the three longest and prettiest runs of the day, but for the other 69 minutes it was all X-Women, the No. 2 seed.

X coach Mike Cavanagh, a former hooker himself, depends on his aggressive pack, with huge props Sam Lake and Jo Alphonso leading the way forward.

Against No. 7 Queen’s, Alphonso was player of the game with three tries, each a virtual copy of the one before.

When X gets the ball close to the try line, she picks up from a ruck and dives or spins or bulls her way across the line.

There’s no stopping it.

“They came out and scored early here and I said to myself, ‘Oh no, here we go again,” said Cavanagh, thinking back to a loss to Queen’s a few weeks ago.

“But we came back right away and answered, then we kept the momentum up, stuck to the game plan and played the game in their half. They have some dangerous players, which if we gave them time and space they would punish us. Everything sort of went our way.”

Danielle Franada was six for

six on conversions, including

one from the sideline, and Carly Walters, Sarah Hoerig and Danielle Cormier of Halifax scored tries, all stemming from dominance up front.

Cavanagh said his pack hasn’t played as well all season as it did on Thursday.

“In the past we have, but not this year, no,” he said. “I think we still have more, we have confidence in each other, we’re getting better at what we’re doing and believing in it. And when we gave the ball to the backs, they had a couple of nice runs, too, which is nice.”

Amelia Lawton, Nadia Popov and national player of the year Sophie de Goede scored tries for Queen’s.

“Every time we let them go, they punished us, they had some big runs,” said Cavanagh who, like everyone else, is impressed by de Goede.

“She comes from good genes, her mom and dad both played for Canada, both captains.”

X meets Laval in a 4:30 semifinal on Friday in a rematch of last year’s semi, won by the Rouge et Or.

Laval, ranked No. 6, opened the tournament with a 28-22 victory over No. 3 Calgary.

Marie-Laura Choquette scored three tries for Laval while Eliane Cote had one and Veronique Gagne had two penalty kicks and a conversion. Taejah Thompson, Elysa Sandron, Erin Geddie and Alyson MacDougall had tries for Calgary.

The host Acadia Axewomen, the No. 8 seed, came within 30 seconds of an upset over the No.1 seed and defending champion Ottawa Gee-Gees.

Sydney Smith scored a try at the 69:31 mark and Claire Gallagher was good on her third conversion of the game in Ottawa’s 26-24 victory.

Maddie MacKenzie gave the Axewomen their first lead of the game (24-19) with her second try at the 60:37 mark. Alysha Corrigan had a try and two conversions and Gillian Bergsma a try for the Axewomen.

The Gee-Gees led 14-5 at the half and extended the lead to 19-5 before the Axewomen stormed back into the game before a large home crowd.

Ottawa advances to a Friday night semifinal (7 p.m.) against No. 4 Guelph Gryphons, who dropped No.5 Victoria Vikings 54-10.

The Axewomen play the Vikings in the consolation semifinal on Saturday at 2 p.m. while the Gaels and Dinos meet at 11:30 a.m.