Eight Mount boats, seven Stotesbury medals

Posted 5/23/16

Mount St. Joseph lightweight eight rowers (from left), Erica Arnold, Shannon Hughes, and Vicki Matsinger enjoy their victory as stroke seat Julia Comerford celebrates with coxswain Shannon LoStracco. …

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Eight Mount boats, seven Stotesbury medals

Posted

Mount St. Joseph lightweight eight rowers (from left), Erica Arnold, Shannon Hughes, and Vicki Matsinger enjoy their victory as stroke seat Julia Comerford celebrates with coxswain Shannon LoStracco. Next to them, the mood is different in the T.C. Williams eight. (Photo by Tom Utescher) Mount St. Joseph lightweight eight rowers (from left), Erica Arnold, Shannon Hughes, and Vicki Matsinger enjoy their victory as stroke seat Julia Comerford celebrates with coxswain Shannon LoStracco. Next to them, the mood is different in the T.C. Williams eight. (Photo by Tom Utescher)

by Tom Utescher

Of the eight boats that Mount St. Joseph Academy entered at the 90th annual Stotesbury Cup Regatta last weekend, seven came home with medals.

Leading the Magic parade was the lightweight eight, which won a gold medal and claimed the Steven Weir Trophy for the second year in a row.

Underscoring the depth of the lightweight program, the Mount’s lightweight four won a silver medal last Sunday, and pointing toward future success was a freshman eight that also struck Stotesbury silver.

Bronze medals were earned by the junior four, junior eight, second eight, and senior eight. It was the first time that even one MSJ four had medalled at the prestigious regatta.

The fact that there could be the slightest sense of disappointment in an across-the-board performance that would’ve thrilled most schools reflects the longtime strength of the Mount St. program and the expectations of the young women who drive it. Both the junior and senior eights had been gold medalists at the City Championships at the beginning of May, and the senior eight (referred to as the “varsity” eight in most circles) was the two-time defending champion at Stotesbury.

The weather was beautiful on Friday when the members of the MSJ flagship [Lindsey Maiale (cox), Erin McGreevey, Christina Knox, Cait Hagan, Maddie Lauinger, Alex Natale, Maddie Carlton, Grace Comerford, Alex Uzzo] put up the best numbers in a field of 31 in time trials.

On Saturday, the all-day wash-out predicted just a few days earlier didn’t materialize for much of the day, and at the end of the morning the Magic turned in the best time of all senior eights in three semifinal races.

With less than an hour left in the second day of the regatta rain finally arrived, and the mood of the Mounties would soon take a downturn, too. Washington’s National Cathedral Prep, whose times had been close to the Mount’s in the first two stages of Stotesbury, gave a worthy gold medal effort to win in four minutes, 53.08 seconds.

In prime position in lane three, Mount St. Joe was trailing Merion Mercy in lane two but appeared to be gaining with a bit over 100 meters to go. Merion quickly countered and widened the gap again, capturing the silver medal in 4:55.16 while the Magic took the bronze in 4:57.51, two seconds ahead of Manhasset (N.Y.) High School.

“We rowed a good race,” commented Mount varsity coach Mike McKenna, “but in a very strong field it wasn’t good enough – we just got beat.”

After watching the early portion of the race, he related, “I thought we would get stronger in the second half, but it seemed like everybody else had the extra gear that we usually have in that situation, and we just couldn’t summon that up.

“The girls were crestfallen,” he continued, “but I wasn’t disappointed in the way they rowed. I just felt bad for them.”

Over the years, Mount St. Joseph’s lightweight eights have been among the most heralded boats in the program, and they came through last weekend by retaining the Weir Trophy. However, after winning the time trials by more than six seconds and putting up the best semifinal time by eight ticks, the scale-friendly Mounties [Shannon LoStracco (cox), Julia Comerford (stroke), Vicki Matsinger, Shannon Hughes, Erica Arnold, Molly Whalen, Brooke Gimaro, Katelin Cordero, Rachel Sandquist] found themselves in a real scrap in the final race.

“They actually made it harder on themselves than it had to be,” Coach McKenna said.

Although the last four boats were far astern, the Mount was being seriously challenged by Virginia’s T.C. Williams High School, which had been the winner of the other (albeit much slower) semifinal race.

The Magic strayed from their race plan somewhat, letting their adrenalin push their strokes-per-minute rating higher than it should have been, and putting them in danger of wearing themselves out before the end of the contest. Fortunately, they had enough stamina to fend off their Virginia rivals and win by a little over a second-and-a-half (4:59.10 to 5:00.76).

“They were overly amped-up and they rowed not a little too high, but way too high,” McKenna stated. “It wasn’t a weak row, but it also wasn’t a smart row, putting themselves in that situation physiologically. I was pleasantly surprised that they had it in them to hold on and win the race, but we could’ve won more easily if we’d rowed smarter.”

The Magic’s lightweight four [Olivia Kylander (cox), Paige Comtois (stroke), Maddy Sandquist, Maddie Curran, Emma French] finished the Friday time trials ranked second by four seconds to Ontario’s E.L. Crossley Secondary School. The Mount was six seconds faster when the two raced in separate semifinal flights, but the Canadians hardly had to floor it to win against some relatively sluggish rivals in their section.

Crossley dialed it up again to win the final in 5:29.00, while Mount St. Joe was the silver medalist in 5:33.98, well ahead of the bronze boat from New Jersey’s Absegami High School (5:39.53).

Beginning official competition a bit later in the season than many programs, the MSJ freshmen usually lag a little at the outset of each season. This year’s group was the same but then made some rapid strides, winning the gold medal at the City Championships. They had a formidable Stotesbury rival in Saratoga Springs High School, many of whose athletes row club crew with the Saratoga Rowing Association and start out in seventh or eighth grade, instead of ninth.

Saratoga came down the course four seconds faster than the Magic to win the time trials, and in separate semifinals the New York boat won its flight with the fastest time overall while the Mounties [Katie Greed (cox), Julia Woodrow (stroke), Katie Edling, Harriett Blatney, Lauren Kiefner, Gia Hunt, Eileen McKenna, Claire Broderick, Caroline Timoney] took around four seconds longer to win their race. In the third semifinal section, victorious T.C. Williams was another five seconds off the Mount’s pace.

In the finals, the MSJ ninth-graders attacked late and halved the gap from previous rounds. Saratoga still took the gold (5:01.23), while Mount St. Joseph snagged the silver (5:03.19) ahead of T.C. (5:07.55). Mount novices coach Alanna McCloy pointed out that when her charges first met Saratoga this season at an invitational regatta, the New York boat had been 19 seconds faster.

In the junior four, two crews from Ontario proved the cream of the crop, turning in the top results in qualifying, the semifinals, and the finals.

Mount St. Joseph’s senior eight (second from right) could not catch Stotesbury silver medalist Merion Mercy (right), while gold medalist National Cathedral Prep (left) put everyone in their wake, including a Manhasset High School crew (second from left) that finished fourth behind the Mount. (Photo by Tom Utescher) Mount St. Joseph’s senior eight (second from right) could not catch Stotesbury silver medalist Merion Mercy (right), while gold medalist National Cathedral Prep (left) put everyone in their wake, including a Manhasset High School crew (second from left) that finished fourth behind the Mount. (Photo by Tom Utescher)[/caption]

They each won one of the first two semifinals, with the Mount [Maddie Walsh (cox), Karsen Healy (stroke), Olivia Snakard, Kerry Faust, Christie Faust] finishing first in the third flight.

In the final, Branksome Hall won the gold medal in 5:26.94, shading their countrywomen from Governor Simcoe (5:28.53). The Mount’s closest challenge from behind came from Lower Merion High School, and in the finals the Magic (5:36.77) held off the Aces (5:38.64) to take away the bronze medal.

New Jersey’s Holy Spirit High School was the top boat in the junior eight time trials, four seconds ahead of number two Mount St. Joe [Abby Schwenger (cox), Brayslin Gallagher (stroke), Celene Mina, Sam Cordero, Sam Altomare, Cathryn Antonacio, Michelle Lipovski, Gabi Natale, Emma Veon]. Each would win one of the three semifinal flights, but the fastest semifinal race winner was Niskayuna, a crew from upstate New York which had been just a fraction of second behind the Magic in qualifying.

The semifinal times were an accurate predictor for the medalists in the finals; gold to Niskayuna (5:02.12), silver to Spirit (5:04.62), and bronze to the Mounties (5:05.58). A more dramatic finish came after that, as Philadelphia City Rowing won fourth place in 5:11.22, one-hundredth of a second ahead of a crew from Woodrow Wilson, a public high school in Washington, D.C.

Hard to predict at times, the Mount’s senior-dominated second eight ranked sixth in the time trials, almost 20 seconds behind the top boat from National Cathedral Prep. After that, the MSJ veterans [Emily Woodrow (cox), Grace Little, Julianna Hunt, Brooke McMahon, Demi Simms, Olivia Tice-Carroll, Mia Fitzpatrick, Dana Mischler, Zoe Ramos] improved their standing considerably.

In the second of the two semifinal flights, they were runner-up to T.C. Williams and had the third-best time overall. National Cathedral won the final comfortably in 4:59.15, but the silver medalist Titans (T.C.’s mascot, remember them?) had the Mount close behind (5:04.78 to 5:05.24). After the Magic bagged the bronze medal, Radnor High School was fourth in 5:12.43.

Mount St. Joe will take the entire gang out to the Scholastic Nationals in Ohio this coming weekend, and a few weeks later the varsity eight, lightweight eight, and lightweight four will race in the U.S. Rowing Youth National Championships at Mercer Lake in New Jersey.

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