Villanova women’s rowing returned to the Cooper River in Pennsauken, NJ this past weekend for the Knecht Cup. The Wildcats delivered a significant improvement among all boats, including a first-place finish in the Second Varsity Four Petite Final.
“We knew we had to push beyond our previous limits,” head coach Carissa Adams said.
In the women’s spring opener at the Doc Hosea Invitational, all four boats reached the Petite Finals, but Villanova only furthered its momentum in Pennsauken. Competing against 57 other collegiate rowing teams, four Wildcat boats reached the finals: the Varsity Eight (V8), Second Varsity Eight (2V8), Varsity Four (V4) and Second Varsity Four (2V4).
On Sunday, the finals began with an exciting race in the 2V4, in Wildcats’ Petite Final race. Senior coxswain Abby Shang, junior Meg Wolf, sophomore Sarah McKee, sophomore Isabelle Rotival and sophomore Taylor Pansy rowed neck-and-neck with both the Fordham and Lehigh boats, maintaining only the narrowest of leads. Despite a late attempt by Lehigh to retake the lead, Villanova fended off its competition, securing a win with a time of 8:37.60.
Competition opened on Saturday in cold and rainy conditions, which brought challenges in the preliminary heats. All four Villanova boats raced in the morning, with goals to sustain a stronger primary time and translate it into secondary races.
In Saturday’s initial performances, the varsity eight boat of junior coxswain Gianna Zajac, junior Maggie Coyne, senior Bailey Bryan, junior Sylvia Marks, sophomore Jalyn Colon, graduate student Jadyn Ramos, graduate student Cecilia Jenkins, senior Silvana Torres and senior Kira Capaldi weathered the inopportune conditions. The team finished second in its heat with a time of 7:22.35, and earned an automatic qualification for the semifinals.
The V8 crew further improved in its semifinal race, finishing nearly five seconds earlier to net a time of 7:17.60. They again crossed the line in second place in what proved to be Villanova’s first appearance in the Knecht Cup Grand Final since 2022.
The Wildcats’ varsity four crew, comprised of junior coxswain Cate Donnelly, sophomore Natalia Brozyna, sophomore Mary Tracy, junior Sabrina Pauli and junior Emmi Stanton, also had a successful performance on Saturday. The group advanced after finishing third in its morning heat in 9:11.63. In the afternoon semifinal, the group continued to improve, cutting nine seconds from their heat time and finishing fifth at 9:02.46, which secured a place in Sunday’s Petite Final.
The second varsity four boat consisted of Shang, Wolf, McKee, Rotival and Pansy. The crew qualified for the semifinals with a third-place finish (9:27.05) in its heat. In a huge improvement, the rowers removed nearly 24 seconds from their semifinal to finish fifth in the final with a time of 9:02.46.
“We took a lot of time to rethink our nutrition, from the night before, to breakfast and even a carb-loaded snack an hour prior,” Adams said of the recovery that resulted in the significant time improvement. “It all paid off.”
The second varsity eight crew, led by junior coxswain Kate Shipley, sophomore Natalia Peng, junior Sarah Robillard, sophomore Ava DeJong, sophomore Anna Primmer, sophomore Olivia Weglarz, sophomore Maddie Sumnar, sophomore Ella Carrier and senior Grace Quirk, narrowly missed advancing to the finals. The team finished third in its heat at 7:46.58, just .17 seconds short of the next boat and the semifinal cutoff.
The V4 team raced shortly afterward in its own Petite Final, finishing sixth with a time of 8:44.31. Donnelly, Brozyna, Tracy, Pauli and Stanton initially started off hot, but ultimately ended four seconds behind Fairfield.
In the afternoon, the varsity eight team competed in the renowned Ann Harris Smith Memorial Trophy Grand Final. Villanova’s V8 boat initially started strong, but later fell behind, resulting in a sixth-place finish with a time of 6:48.45. Despite this finish, the boat still improved upon its semifinal time by almost 30 seconds.
“Our next challenge is exposure therapy, to see what top-level D1 programs are doing,” Adams said. “If we don’t experience [top- level competition] firsthand, we can’t set the goals to reach that level.”
The team will now have a break before returning to action at the Lake Wheeler Invitational in Raleigh, NC on April 25 and April 26.
