North Allegheny rowers qualify for championship

Jerry Clark
Sports Editor
Thursday, June 22, 2006

The North Allegheny crew team has been growing and expanding as of late, and they continue to bring home the hardware to prove it.

Recently the boys' and girls' teams qualified five boats to compete in the U.S. National Rowing Youth Championships.

The boats qualified by winning the mid-west scholastic championship in most events.

Although they only took four of the five qualifying boats, all four made it to the grand finals, and two boats earned silver medals, one earned a bronze and the other finished in fourth place.

In the men's single race, Singen Elliott finished second an incredibly close race, missing the gold by .3 seconds.

In the men's double race, Rory Dahl and Joseph Brendel took a silver medal.

The women's quad brought home a bronze, as Brittany Kelly, Erin Dauson, Liz Rebhun and Briana Pittman raced an incredible race, narrowly missing the first place team by .38 seconds.

"I am pleased with the progress and the new depths the program has reached," said Melissa Titus, the boys head coach. "It is nice to see us grow and improve."

Neither team is finished for the summer, as the girls will send either a double, or a quad to compete in for a spot in the U.S. National Team Trials. If they can win that race, they will head to the Junior World Championships held in Amsterdam in August.

As for the boys, Elliott is headed to the Junior National Team Selection Camp for a chance to make the U.S. men's eight, who last year won a gold medal and are looking to repeat.

The rest of the team will participate in summer sculling to prepare themselves for two regattas later this summer. The big race is the Stokesbury Regatta, the largest high school regatta in the country.

"Our goal each year is to improve," Titus said. "Last time we came home with three medals."

The junior men's quad earned a gold medal last year, and this year four new participants, Brian Marcus, Steve Marcus, Adam Reckless and Mark Nolsi, will go for another gold for North Allegheny.

Kelly, Dauson, Rebhun and Pittman took a sliver in the senior quad race, while Elliott, Dahl, Brendel and Bill Francis took a bronze in the mens quad.