Thursday April 13th was the Semifinals for the tournament, and the first games of the week for our Virginia teams. Starting at 9am, the Virginia Men beat the Cornell men 19 to 7. Later, at 11am, the Virginia women took on SMU women, ending the game with a win and a score of 23 to 3. Both UVA teams were on to the finals!

Saturday April 15th the finals were held. The women’s game was first with UVA pitted against Texas A&M. The score remained close throughout the game with the final buzzer going off with a tie of 12 to 12. It was on to a shoot out! The even match continued throughout the first round of the shootout, with Katie Define sinking her penalty shot matched by one A&M player doing the same. Sadly in the second round only an A&M player was able to strike the goal, making them the 2023 National Intercollegiate champions and a loss for Virginia.

At noon the UVA men took to the arena to battle it out against University of North Texas. They never stopped fighting and played hard, but were unable to defeat the UNT team with the talented Miller brothers. UNT came to the D1 NIC to claim the championship this year 14 to 9, after losing to our team in 2022.

Though we didn’t win the championship title, we did take home a number of great awards:

All Star Players: Alana Benz, Jim Deal, and Parker Pearce

Horsemanship Award: Vlad Tarashansky

Best Playing String Awards: UVA Men’s String and UVA Women’s String

Best Playing Pony Men’s Division: Sativa

We hope you’ll enjoy photos from the finals below!