US Collegiate Rowing – Week One Race Preview

With the opening salvos completed, the US Collegiate racing season begins in earnest this week as action erupts across the country. With dozens of teams facing off across the US, here are just three of the most important events going down this weekend.

Brown vs Boston University

Taking its regular place as the first dual race for east-coast contenders, Brown travel to Boston to take on the Boston University Terriers on a newly thawed Charles River. Two programmes with very different expectations, they had rather opposite emotions coming out of the national championships last spring. For the Bears, being in the petite final was a disappointment following their victory at the Eastern Sprints, while a top ten finish for BU was a great weekend’s result.

This season, there is a lot of change for the men from Rhode Island as they look to rebuild their programme, while the Terriers have six of their eight from ten months ago. This first outing could be an opportunity for Boston University to make a big splash, given Paul Cooke’s men typically have a slower start to the season.

Big Ten/Ivy/ACC Dustup

On the women’s side, the Cooper River in Camden County will play host to strong challengers from some of the top rowing conferences in the country as we see championship contenders from the Ivy League, Big Ten and ACC racing against each other in a series of duals. The full running order is yet to be confirmed but touted matchups like Michigan versus Yale and Penn versus Syracuse whet the appetite.

In the latter event, it will be the first opportunity for Head Coach Bill Manning to show what his new-look Penn Quakers are capable of. The former Princeton assistant takes over from Wesley Ng who led the programme to previously unseen heights but departed to take over at Virginia. It will be exciting to see if have been able to continue the positive momentum on boathouse row. 

Northeastern vs Penn

Rounding out the weekend on Sunday, the Northeastern Huskies travel south to Philadelphia to take on the Penn men’s squad. This historic cup match was a relatively late addition to their respective squads. These two programmes have much in common, led by coaches in their first few seasons, both seen as on the rise and were separated by just three tenths of a second at the national championships last June.

This year, Penn return almost all of their team from that event and should be firing on all cylinders ready to attack the new season. Al Monte will have his eyes on a medal at the Eastern Sprints and if they have made that sort of progress this weekend may show.

While this weekend will not be a definitive read of the championship races later in the season, it will be a good indicator of what we can expect throughout the dual racing.

About The Author

Fraser Innes

Fraser joined the JRN team in September 2022 and regularly writes about domestic and international rowing with particular specialisation on US Collegiate Rowing having launched JRN’s coverage and being a staple on the End of the Island’s series on the topic. He has been involved with the sport since 2016 at George Heriot’s School and the Universities of Glasgow and Wisconsin.

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