Cindy Nelles and Colleen Irowa scored two tries apiece as the McMaster Marauders earned their first Monilex Trophy with a 27-3 win over the tournament host Queen's Gaels in the gold-medal final of the CIS women's rugby championship on Sunday.
It was a return trip to the national final for the OUA champion Marauders, who dropped a wild 43-34 decision to St.FX in last year's title match in Guelph. McMaster had also lost 15-10 to Guelph in Hamilton in the final of the inaugural CIS championship back in 1998.
McMaster also avenged its only loss of the season, a 15-14 setback against Queen's in the OUA opener on Sept. 13.
"It's absolutely been an incredible journey," said Nelles. "This team has come so far from when I first came to McMaster and it's been absolutely amazing to be a part of that journey."
Added head coach Shaun Allen: "It's a huge reward for the amount of work that the players have done this season. ... I'm incredibly proud right now."
Despite the loss, Queen's still achieved the best result in program history, surpassing a CIS bronze medal in 2013. Head coach Beth Barz credited the Marauders for their play but was also proud of her group.
"They worked their tails off the whole game," she said. "Realistically McMaster had a pick-and-go that we had a hard time stopping even though we certainly worked to do it and had some success at times. It sure was fun to watch our team this tournament and man they played with a lot of heart today."
Earlier Sunday, the Ottawa Gee-Gees picked up their first CIS women's rugby medal with a 65-7 victory over the Concordia Stingers in the third-place match.
The Gee-Gees had played in the CIS third-place game a year ago, falling to Western 17-5.
"The girls really bounced back from a tough lost yesterday," said coach Jennifer Boyd, whose team dropped the semifinal to McMaster 14-8 on Saturday. "I'm really happy with the leadership of the team this year and they performed really well today."
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