Fairfield, Conn. — Drake Rowing wrapped up competition in the Sacred Heart Open, with racing on Saturday, April 26 and Sunday, April 27. The Bulldogs went up against MAAC conference competition in Sacred Heart (picked No. 2 in pre-season poll) and Canisius (picked No. 7), and finished in last place. The three schools raced for official results on Saturday and a controlled regatta scrimmage on Sunday.
 
"They beat us today, but we rowed hard and learned a lot," Head Coach Charlie DiSilvestro said. "We didn't execute our race plan as well as we wanted to on Saturday. We made some adjustments for Sunday. On Saturday, we had technical errors. We didn't row with the patience and control we did in our preview meets."
 
Saturday's results will count towards conference seeding for the MAAC Championship on Sunday, May 18, in Camden, New Jersey. Those results: on Saturday, Drake's first varsity eight finished at 7:13.2, the second varsity eight finished at 7:14.2 and the varsity four finished at 9:06.9.
 
"It was good to see conference competition now for the first time instead of at the conference championship," DiSilvestro said. "This will probably be the deepest conference we've ever had. But the team performed well, and they tried hard. I scheduled this race so we could see the top conference competition before the championship. If we had a bad race, I wanted it to be in April, not May. They aren't satisfied, but they learned. We'll apply the changes next week for Iowa and train hard for the conference championship."
 
Saturday Results
First Varsity Eight - 3rd place, 7:13.2
Coxswain: Camille Gretter
Jessica Seelinger
Allyson Afrank
Caitlyn Figge
Liliana Magnuson
Cayden Anderson
Maggie Poltrock
Jazmynn Good
Skyler Duke
 
Second Varsity Eight - 3rd place, 7:14.2
Coxswain: Sarah Chastain
Alana Rater
Claire Martin
Lillian Bitker
Camille Cole
Lucy Grizzle
Hailey Castelar
Gracie Joblinske
 
Varsity Four - 3rd place, 9:06.9
Zoey Borkowski
Katherine Hanses
Noelle Burke
Kaylee Counter
Izzy Silva