Lehigh heads to Patriot League Championships on Sunday
Posted: 04/27/2012
BETHLEHEM, Pa. - In the midst of a strong spring season, the Lehigh women’s rowing team heads to the Patriot League Championships on Sunday. The regatta will begin at 8 a.m. on the Cooper River in Camden, N.J. The Mountain Hawks look to build off momentum from last week’s win over Lafayette and improve on last year’s league championship campaign which saw them nearly double the previous year’s output.
“The team has found a lot of speed over the course of the year and we really put a lot of focus on ourselves and how we’re going to make our boat move faster,” said Lehigh head coach Brian Conley. “There’s nothing we can do about another team's speed, but we can make ourselves faster. It’s exciting to see the women find more speed and try to put that on the water in races. We talk often about the Patriot League Championships during the year; it’s where we’ll judge a lot about how much we have improved this year. If we put together the race that I think we can, it will be an exciting day for Lehigh.”
The Mountain Hawks finished with 10 points at last season’s championships, led by Second Varsity Eight which placed fourth.
Lehigh enters this season Patriot League Championships with momentum after dominating Lafayette to capture the River Cup. That included a win in the Varsity Eight by nearly 20 seconds.
“Racing Lafayette is always a lot of fun for the team,” said Conley. “Bringing the three cups back to Lehigh is really special and exciting for the team.
“After our race last weekend, the team has a strong sense of confidence in their ability to row,” Conley continued. “They’re also keeping things realistic and focused on the important things and that is boat speed and maximizing our efficiency on the water. Bucknell and Navy seem to always be near the top in the last few years, but the great thing about a new year is anything can happen. Our goals are always to have our best race and if we do that, we’ll find success on the water and in the results.”
Both Lehigh men’s and women’s teams will return to action on May 11-12 when they row in the Dad Vail Regatta on the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia.