Author: Julius Saporito

By Julius Saporito

Faith Watkins is an employee at the Modell’s sporting goods store located on Dixwell Avenue. Watkins has just started working there and has really enjoyed her time. It has only been a total of 3 weeks but she feels she is at the right place.

With the combination of her passion for sports and wanting to give back to her community, Watkins wanted to help out while things are bound to get hectic with the holiday season shopping. 

“ I like it here, I am very interested in sports and that’s why I applied for this job and this is my second job,” Watkins said. “However, I also applied here to do the holiday time and also I know they needed the extra help.”

The store is seeking business and during the holiday part of the year with everyone looking to buy great gifts for each other, sports gear will always be something that is needed and Modell’s will be expecting people to walk through its doors.

“Business has been really good” Watkins said. “It’s very busy. The Hamden Plaza is a busy area so we tend to see a lot of business. Especially around the holiday time with having very good sales around the store will be expecting it to be very busy in here.”

What makes Watkins happy is seeing that people are happier getting the things they need. That is why she loves when the store has things on sale because it makes things easier for the people.

“It’s great place and we definitely look forward to seeing a lot of people for the holidays and making our customers satisfied with prices that could help them,” Watkins said.

By Julius Saporito

Jennifer Fontaine has been working at Bob’s Stores located Dixwell Avenue for 10 years. She is currently the supervisor at the store and really loves her position. She looks at Bob’s Stores as not just a place of work, but a place of learning.

“I have been here ever since high school, so it’s been a long time and I have learned so much here and this place has really given me a lot,” Fontaine said. “I learned how to work and communicate with other people something I was not the best at when I was younger.”

It was recently that the store had a lot of people come in for the Black Friday deals and is one of the store’s busiest days of the year.

“It is just expected at this point and is no surprise to me by now,” Fontaine said. “We know how well to plan for this and things ran very smoothly at the store.”

The holiday season is here and from what she knows from the past and being there for so long, she expects the store to be “epic.”

“It is going to be epic in here and that’s just the way it’s been, but we’ll do well like we always do.”

By Julius Saporito

The National Intercollegiate Rugby Association (NIRA) announced that Quinnipiac will host the tournament’s final four from Friday, Nov. 17 to Sunday, Nov. 19.

“The semifinals being at 10 a.m. on Friday is a difficult time window but we have no doubt the usual QU fan base will be on hand in addition to the the two other teams battling at 1 p.m.,” said Quinnipiac rugby head coach Rebecca Carlson.

Brown University was the host of the 2015 championship and in 2016 the championship was played at West Point at the United States Military Academy. Quinnipiac is the league’s two-time defending national champion and is looking to repeat its winning streak.

In 2015, the team got its first championship topping Army 24-19, and went in with a five-game winning streak. The team’s second championship win last season came to a 46-24 score in a win over Central Washington and was its only win in the series against Central Washington. Coming into that season, the Quinnipiac women’s rugby team was ranked No. 2 in a NIRA coaches poll.

This season the team was granted a new and improved playing surface and new scoreboard for bringing in two consecutive championship titles, a very big contribution to the school’s program exposure.

Coach Carlson talked about how having the new parts of the facility adds to the team morale going into playoff.

“Great to have the space. Honored to be at home,” Carlson said. “We still have a ways to go to be one of the top rugby facilities in the country across both genders but a will get there.”

Carlson’s team has been successful again this season as it has made it to the tournament’s semifinals for the third-straight season.

Coach Carlson also added to how tough the team’s competition would be and how the team expects to finish out the year.  

“Our schedule was the most down challenging in the entire country,” Carlson said. “We played 9 NIRA games prior to playoffs while our opponents and the other side of the bracket played less than 5. Our adversity and two losses were/are more valuable than any team with a soft schedule and undefeated status, we expect to finish strong.”

Quinnipiac will face Central Washington in one of the semifinals on Friday. Dartmouth and Harvard will play against each other in the other semifinal, which is also on Friday. The winner of each game will face each other in the national championship game, which will take place on Sunday.