March 14, 2007

PHILADELPHIA - This Saturday, March 17th the SJU men's rowing team opens its 2007 spring season at the 8th annual Jesuit Invitational on the Cooper River in Cherry Hill, NJ.

The Hawks will face solid competition from other Jesuit universities along the east coast including Georgetown, Loyola, Fordham, Fairfield, Holy Cross and Boston College. The SJU men will be looking to improve upon their 2006 performance in which they won the 2nd Freshmen 8 event, placed second in four events (2nd Varsity 8, Varsity Lightweight 8, Freshmen 8, and Varsity 4), and placed third in the Varsity Heavyweight 8.

The Hawks bring an experienced varsity team into this season opener with 11 seniors who have all won the Jesuit Invitational at least once during their tenure on Hawk Hill. Captain Alex DiBiasi will lead the Varsity Heavyweight 8 as they look to avenge last year's loss to Georgetown and Holy Cross.

"Last year we led the first half of this race," DiBiasi said "But we ran out of energy and fell behind in the third 500. This year we have worked very hard to improve our conditioning and technique. It should pay big dividends in the later stages of the race."

For the SJU Freshmen this Saturday marks the first spring season race of their careers. This past fall the SJU Frosh won the only two events they entered (Navy Day Regatta and Frostbite Regatta) and they are poised to pick up right where they left off.

"The Freshmen had a solid spring break and have showed some early season speed by keeping up with the Varsity Lightweights at Camp Bob," commented Freshmen Coach Dan Goettner. "They expect to be the fastest Frosh 8 we've ever had. If they continue to develop this spring they have a good chance of winning Dad Vails.

Racing begins this Saturday at 10:00 AM and goes through to about 12:30 PM. Directions to the racecourse can be found at: http://www.row2k.com/ira/directn.html.