By Bradley Rosenberg

The varsity women’s crew team claimed 14th place in the Eastern Sprints of Camden, N.J., Sunday, putting forth a strong effort in what would be their last showing of the season. Unfortunately, the Cooper River water was too thick with heavy competition for their attempts to be rewarded.

“I felt they rowed with great heat and great intensity,” said Northeastern coach Joe Wilhelm. “It turned out, unfortunately, that that’s where [the] speed [of this year’s varsity crew team] put us. We weren’t disappointed with our performance, we were disappointed with where we ended up.”

Each boat raced twice during the Eastern Sprints — once in the morning and once in the afternoon. Boats that finished in one of the top places of the first race moved on to the grand final. Boats that finished higher than 5th competed in the petite final, and ones that finished below 5th, went to the 3rd level final.

The NU varsity boat missed making the petite final by 24 hundredths of a second to Wisconsin, and wound up taking second in the 3rd level final.

Wilhelm says that the girls would have taken a higher ranking in the 3rd level final if they hadn’t put forth so much effort in their opening heat.

“We kind of paid for the morning race in the afternoon,” Wilhelm said. “The crew tried hard, but the afternoon row was a little bit flat.

“Also, I think that our crew would have raced a little bit harder if they were racing for something that mattered,” added Wilhelm, referring to the discouragement the girls felt by not qualifying for the petite finals.

The Junior Varsity boat, meanwhile, rowed what Wilhelm called “the best races they’ve rowed all year.” It finished fourth in their petite final to earn tenth place overall.

Junior Varsity rower and Northeastern junior Candice Watkins said the great showing in the petite final could be credited to a second wind.

“We treated our second thousand like a separate piece [of the race],” she explained, “and we wound up walking through BU and passing up Syracuse. It was an amazing race. I couldn’t ask for a better way to end the season.”

“We had a couple of seniors [on the boat] who were just thrilled to have that as their last race,” she added.

“They rode with a lot of fire,” commented Wilhelm. “They did what they had to do.”

Finally, the novices took second in the petite final, a strong showing, but still disappointing to a boat that has performed better throughout the season.

“The novice definitely did not have their best race in their heat,” said Watkins. “They under performed, and the race was not representative of what they did the rest of the season.”

Watkins also commented that it was “only one bad race,” however, and noted that the team’s time in the petite finals correlated with the top four in the grand finals.

“I think the novices were in a tough heat,” the coach said. “I’m not disappointed with their efforts. I’m disappointed with the results.”

Wilhelm is no longer dwelling on Sunday’s competition, however, he wants to get started on preparing his team for next year.

The only thing that gives him pause is the loss of his team’s seniors.

“I think we’re definitely going to miss them,” he said. “It’s a great class, and they were part of the core of our team. I think we have a lot of good juniors, sophomores, and freshman, though, and hopefully they can step it up.”

Wilhelm says that he’s convinced that the team has the potential for a great team, and that the girls can accomplish great things.

“I think we have a lot of depth for next year,” he says. “I’m definitely optimistic.”

The meet marked the final race for seniors Cassandra Brown, Kathleen Lavell, Laura Nickerson, Samantha Twardowski, and Sally Worrall.