After coming close to reaching it the last two years, the Grand Canyon University Women's Rugby has arrived in Houston, Texas, to battle for the College Rugby Association of America Women's D1 Spring Championship against Stanford University. The match will be the last of six different championship matches that will happen over the next 48 hours as part of the CRAA XV Championship Weekend, with three different men's title matches happening at the venue Saturday, then a men's and a women's match Sunday preceding the Lopes/Cardinal showdown, which is set for 1PM Arizona time Sunday afternoon.
 
The Lopes have been at the precipice of nationals each of the last two seasons, and it's been Stanford that has either dashed their hopes or pushed them closer to it. In 2022, the upstart Lopes earned a CRAA Western Regionals bid after throttling UCLA in the PDRC Playoffs. They headed to Palo Alto, California, and faced the host Cardinal in the semifinals, pulling off a stunning 26-24 upset over Stanford before losing the chance for nationals at the hands of mighty BYU in the finals. A year later with an identical scenario, venue and semifinals matchup, the Cardinal relegated the Lopes to the 3^rd-place match after dispatching GCU, 39-22, in the semis.
 
This year, the Lopes hosted the revamped, eight-team, CRAA Regional Tournament at GCU Soccer Stadium on the GCU campus two weeks ago. However, due to the expanded format, the Lopes and Cardinal were on different sides of the bracket and never faced each other. That fact allowed them to both punch their tickets to Sunday's match by sweeping their two matches, with Stanford topping the University of Florida and then a scrappy Western Washington University squad, while the Lopes battled from behind in both matches to beat the University of California-Berkeley in Friday's quarterfinals, then the University of Virginia in Sunday's semifinal.
 
It's the first national title match for the Lopes in 15's play since splitting their two pool-play matches at the USA Rugby Women's D1/D1 Elite National Tournament in 2018. A win over Stanford Sunday would cap off the Lopes' first-ever undefeated season at 10-0. The match will be streamed via The Rugby Network at 1PM Sunday afternoon.