Issue date: 5/6/09 Section: Sports

Media Credit: Whitney Truderung [Click to enlarge]

Despite dealing with bad weather consisting of rains and crosswinds, the Sacramento State rowing team won its third Western Intercollegiate Rowing Association points trophy Sunday.

All six boats: the varsity eight, second varsity eight, novice eight, second novice eight, varsity four and novice four finished among the top six boats in each of the grand finals at the Sacramento State Aquatic Center. This is the Hornets' third WIRA championship win in four years after previously winning in 2006 and 2007.

The crews gathered points from their respective grand final event and the Hornets earned a total of 360 points, defeating second-place Gonzaga with 352 points and UC Davis with 347 points.

This was the first time in school history that all six boats advanced to the grand finals in the same year. The Hornets were also the only team to have all six boats advance to the grand finals at this year's WIRA championships.

Gonzaga won the varsity eight title by crossing the 2000-meter finish line with a time of 6:48.9, edging out the Hornets (6:50.1) by 1.2 seconds.

"We worked really well together and we held our head high knowing that we did something great still," said senior Megan Riggs. "We just need to work on maintaining our speed during the last couple hundred meters of the race, which is where Gonzaga got us."

The Hornets' silver medal marks the ninth medal for Sac State in the WIRA grand final since the program participated in intercollegiate play in 1995. Among the varsity eight, Riggs, senior Anne Morrison (who is a news writer for the State Hornet) and Junior Holly Hopkins, were named first team all-WIRA team.

"All three of them had an outstanding year and it was nice bonus for Anne and Megan as seniors to have that in their last year of rowing," head coach Mike Conners said.

Sac State's novice eight boat won the bronze medal with a time of 7:06.9, its first medal since 2006. Gonzaga won first place with a time of 6:57.0 followed by Western Washington clocking in at 6:59.6. UC Davis rounded out the top four boats of the six-boat event finishing at 7:11.7.

Continued...

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