We are now well into the thicket of racing season and this past weekend saw fast and exciting racing across women’s collegiate rowing. The CRCA/ Pocock Poll came in and some changes to the leaderboard saw #8 Syracuse make the biggest jump upwards by 4 positions. Other teams such as #13 Rutgers, #16 Tennessee and #18 Harvard saw a movement upward on the leaderboard whereas #10 Penn, #12 Ohio State and #14 Indiana lost a point. Congratulations to #19 UCLA for being the newest addition onto the leaderboard!
Stanford USC Duel
On March 29th, NCAA champions, #1 Stanford, topped #17 USC in all boat categories at its season-opening dual that Friday evening. The first varsity and second varsity eight beat their counterparts by 18 second margins respectively, while Stanford’s A varsity four boat crossed the finish line with a time of 7:18.0, followed by its B boat seven seconds later. Stanford looks forward to the UVA Invite on April 13-14, which will be one to watch as they go against #11 Virginia, #5 Yale and #8 Syracuse. Starting the 2024 season off strong, Stanford will be hoping to find new speed this year as they look on to retain their NCAA title.
Sunshine State Invitational
Up in Sarasota at the famous Nathan Benderson Park course, 16 women’s teams went head-to-head at the Sunshine State Invitational. Teams included Iowa, Miami, Tulsa, UCF, and Boston College. Following the heats on Friday, rowers prepared themselves for the finals the following day in what would be very close racing. In the Grand Final, the varsity eights took to the course with Miami coming out on top defeating Iowa (+1.3), Tulsa (+2.8), UCF (+5.5), Boston College (+8.7), Michigan State (+10.4), North Carolina (+11.5) and Drexel (+13.1).
Princeton vs Brown: The Class of 1987 Trophy
#3 Princeton Women’s crew retained the Class of 1987 Trophy on Saturday, winning five of the six races at Lake Carnegie over the #6 Brown. The varsity eight retained the trophy for the sixth straight year with a 3.2-second victory with a time of 6.34.8. They look forward to their next important race on April 12-13 at the Ivy Invite.
Doc Hosea Invitational
Down on the Cooper River in Cherry Hill N.J crews from #10 Penn, Northeastern, #13 Rutgers, Columbia battled it out over the 2k course. Penn had an extremely successful day, winning the title across all three NCAA boats and bringing the Doc Hosea Points Trophy back to their boathouse. The Grand Final saw a six-boat race, with Penn shaving off more than nine seconds from their heat, clocking in a winning time of 6:17.7, this being more than three seconds ahead of Rutgers who crossed the finish line with time 6:20.9 and more than 10 seconds ahead of Northeastern (6:27.9). Their win over the Huskies alongside defeating Syracuse last week at the Big Ivy Dustup allowed the varsity eight to retain the Orange Challenge Cup.
Big ten/ ACC Double Duel
#9 Michigan dominated racing on Saturday in Columbus, Ohio against top ACC opponents including #15 Duke, #12 Ohio State and #11 Virginia. Competing primarily against #11 Virginia in the morning and #15 Duke in the afternoon, Michigan won three wins in four varsity eight events as well as a near-sweep from the varsity fours. The varsity eight took the win with a time of 6.53.5 over Virginia with a margin of 4.6 seconds, as well as a 10 second margin over Duke in the afternoon session with a winning time of 6:40.4. Ohio State took the win a with a 10.6 second against Duke in morning but missing out on the win against Virginia in the afternoon by 4.0 seconds. All these programs show promising speed for future races, and it is exciting to see how they will compare to other programs.
Assuredly the racing this week will shake up the CRCA polls ahead of next week’s racing.
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