May 13, 2012
ANNAPOLIS, Md. - The No. 15 Old Dominion University coed sailing team took fifth in the Eastern Division at the ICSA Coed Dinghy National Semifinals this weekend and qualified for the Gill Dinghy ICSA National Championship in June.
ODU earned a bid to the national championships for the fourth consecutive season as a total of 36 teams competed at the event hosted by the U.S. Naval Academy. The top nine teams from each division advanced to the Gill Dinghy ICSA Nationals in Austin, Texas on June 6-8.
The Monarchs were tested with the top three ranked teams in the country and six total top-10 teams in their group but took fifth behind No. 1 Georgetown, No. 6 Roger Williams, No. 3 Stanford and No. 2 College of Charleston. No. 15 ODU finished ahead of No. 7 Hobart and William Smith, No. 8 Brown, No. 12 Dartmouth and No. 19 Boston University who rounded out the national championship qualifiers in the Eastern semifinals.
Racing in the A-Division race for ODU was junior skipper Dillon Paiva and sophomore crew Chloe Constants for all but one race while senior crew Miles Martschink was able to get in for a single race. ODU tied for third in the A-Division race with a score of 70. In the B-Division race, sophomore skipper Brady Stagg and senior crew Emily Reich placed sixth a score of 87.
"The team really sailed well throughout the weekend," said ODU head coach Mitch Brindley on the Monarchs' fifth place finish. "There was a lot of close sailing all weekend with so many good team competing. We were able to come on strong late in the A-Division race to be able to finish well while we caught a few unfortunate breaks in the B-Division race but still very pleased overall with fifth. The team is really looking forward to competing at the national championship in Austin next month."
In the Western Division, No. 16 Miami won the semifinals followed by No. 4 Yale, No. 11 Harvard, No. 18 SUNY-Maritime, No. 5 Boston College, No. 13 Wisconsin, No. 14 Navy, No. 10 Tufts and South Florida who all qualified for nationals next month.