CHERRY HILL, N.J. – The Wesleyan women's crew team completed an incredible run, finishing as the national runner-up in the varsity eight grand final on Saturday at the NCAA Rowing Championships held at Cooper River. This is the highest finish for the Cardinals at the NCAA Championship in program history.

• RESULTS

Combined with the second varsity eight taking fifth place earlier in the morning, Wesleyan scored 45 points as a team to finish second place for the team points trophy behind only the now two-time defending national varsity eight champion Wellesley. Fellow NESCAC rivals Bates and Tufts tied for third place in the points standings with 41 apiece.
 
Led by coxswain Ava Olson '25, the history-making Cardinals rowed the race of their life in the varsity eight grand final. Racing in lane three after qualifying with the top spot in Friday's preliminaries, Wesleyan raced to the finish in 7:09.949, landing 3.674 seconds behind Wellesley and 2.742 seconds ahead of third place finisher Ithaca.
 
Wesleyan fought back for the runner-up finish, siting in fifth place and more than three seconds behind the lead pack after the first 500m. By the halfway point, Wesleyan overtook Williams for fourth place and made a big move past both Tufts and Ithaca at the 1500m mark. Cruising to the finish, the Cardinals had enough to hold off Ithaca and Tufts for the best finish in team history at the NCAA Championships.
 
The second varsity 8 boat battled from lane 6 and managed a fifth place finish out of six boats in the grand final, finishing in 7:21.189. Wesleyan managed a spot in the grand final via the repechage and competed against the top boats in the country including the gold medal winner Bates and runner-up Wellesley.
 
Wesleyan V8 lineup: Olson (cox), Elizabeth Myers '23, Nora Printy '26, Greta Armbrust '25, Cadence Cole '26, Anne Horton '24, Anna Merrifield '24, Shayna McCarthy '24, and Alex Stanislaw '25
 
Wesleyan 2V8 lineup: Noa Pesner '24 (cox), Samiya Shetty '24, Em Moran '26, Peyton Fern '25, Elizabeth Rowe '23, Shelagh Coombs '24, Elise McCamant '24, Meg Alberding '23, and Alex Kuo '26