NA Rowing Medals at Prestigious Stotesbury Cup Regatta

By Karen Price
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Tuesday, May 24, 2005

The North Allegheny rowing team has won plenty of gold medals, but going into this weekend, they had never collected one from the prestigious Stotesbury Cup Regatta in Philadelphia.

And instead of just one, they got two.

Andrew Kaiser and Sean Barunas took gold in the men's senior double scull, while Rory Dahl, Joseph Brendel, Bill Francis and Singen Elliott took gold in the junior quad.

On the women's side, Katie Hodnik, Megan Hudson, Sharon Dauson and Ali Bogart took silver in the senior quad.

The annual regatta on the Schuylkill River features teams from 180 high schools and 11 states, the District of Columbia and Canada.

"It was definitely our best ever performance there," men's coach Melissa Titus said.

The regatta marked the end of the Tigers' spring competition schedule, but several crews will be going on to the USRowing Junior Nationals in June.

North Allegheny qualified nine boats -- three from the women's and six from the men's -- for the national competition based on their performance at the Midwest Championship on May 15, in which 13 boats medaled.

Last year, the Tigers' men's quad took a silver medal at nationals.

"It had been about five years since the guys medaled there, so that was exciting," Titus said. "The girls won gold there about six years ago in the quad. It's definitely competitive."

Titus said that of the nine boats that qualified, they'll likely take two from the women's and two from the men's.

Karen Price can be reached at kprice@tribweb.com.