cuse.com article
The No. 11 Syracuse's varsity 8+ pulled through with the sole Orange victory of the day, securing the Packard Cup against No. 10 Dartmouth. In the dual races, Dartmouth won the 2V8 and the 3V8, but Syracuse took home the trophy by winning the 1V8 in the closest race of the day.
Packard Cup coming back to Cuse! #OrangeNation #believeinORANGE
— Syracuse Men's Crew (@CuseRowing) April 24, 2016
A strong current and slight tailwind made for fast conditions on the Connecticut River in Hanover, New Hampshire. It was a great day for some intense racing! The Packard Cup has been contested between Syracuse and Dartmouth since 1960, and Syracuse has claimed it 28 times since its inception. Special thanks to the coaches, our camera man Assistant Coach Justin Stangel, SARA race broadcast coordinator Colin Goodale '90, and our commentators Tyson Bry '10 and Noah Chase '08 for providing the live video and audio. Being able to watch this level of racing and to cheer on the Orange, whether at home, on the go, or from the shorelines with a stroke-by-stoke report was awesome!
Last year, the Big Green made a clean sweep and after the first two races it appeared they might be able to do it again. The last time Syracuse claimed the Packard Cup was in 2012 while Dartmouth had claimed it the past three years and was looking for a fourth consecutive win. In the first race of the morning, Dartmouth's third varsity crossed the line about five seconds ahead of Syracuse. It was a similar result in the second varsity race, where Syracuse made an aggressive surge in the sprint, but it wasn't enough to overtake Dartmouth who finished in front with a slightly lesser margin of about four seconds, or just over a length.
The varsity eight race was a suspenseful nail-biter that came down to the final strokes. Off the line in the first 500m the crews started out relatively even. When Dartmouth shifted to a powerful rhythm they took a couple of seats, but Syracuse responded to match the pace and started to push back. In the middle 1000m, the Orange were on the move. Coming through the 1000m buoy, it was back and forth, bow ball to bow ball. Once again, Dartmouth gained a few seats with a strong move, but the Orange responded to start taking the seats back. Coming into the last 500m, the Big Green out-stroked the Orange 37.5spm to 36spm and it was a tight race. Syracuse knew it was going to take some guts to secure the win so they shifted up a couple of beats to begin an early sprint before the final 250m. The Orange continued to make a move bumping the rate to 39, then 40spm, while Dartmouth still held 37spm. With 150m to go, the Orange had taken the lead and picked up the rate again to 42spm in the final sprint. Dartmouth couldn't respond and in the closest finish of the day, Syracuse crossed the line less than a full deck up. The official times were Cuse - 5:40.0 and Dartmouth - 5:40.2. And with that, the Orange took home the Packard Cup for the first time in four years.
“It’s a group of guys that has the ability to focus in on the plan. Going in, the plan was to focus on us and keep our heads down and race really hard. We have a lot of respect for those Dartmouth guys. It was a pretty tall order to beat them. I thought we put our heads in our boat and focused on going as fast as we could.”
LIVE on #Periscope: Packard Cup Cuse v Dartmouth https://t.co/sVLOzrzdK4
— Syracuse Men's Crew (@CuseRowing) April 24, 2016
LINE-UPS
1V
C – Santora, Reichard, Dawson, Staprans, McKenney, Messner, Schiera, Douglas, Tavares
2V
C – Kollman, Oster, Conroy, Barni, Leimeister, Walker, Kelley, Johnson, Busco
3V
C – Wagner, Marks, Vanderberg, Weitekamp, Graves, Hunt, Eisenberg, Shober, Bauerfeld
next steps
Once again, the varsity eight demonstrated some serious grit and aggression on the race course. They have been consistently improving and their desire to be in the fight and push through has been a common thread throughout the regular season. It was a thrilling close to the regular season and now the team has three weeks to prepare for the Eastern Sprints on May 15th in Worcester, MA. They are looking to keep building speed in an effort to realize their full potential during what will appear to be some very competitive racing given the close results among EARC crews this season.