The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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AUGUST 2019 THE WOLVERINE 45 Those seniors are Rachel Fanning, Grace Gagliardi, Victoria Glunt, Kath- ryn Grotto, Caroline Hendershot, Meghan Gutknecht, Emily Krebs, Shayla Lamb and Catherine Olson, along with redshirt juniors Perry Bower and Rebecca Joyce. Three of them — Hendershot, Glunt and Grotto — rowed on the varsity eight squad. Sophomore Charlotte Powers served as coxswain on that group, while freshman Jessica Schoon- bee and junior Tayla-May Bentley rowed port, and junior Madison Byrd and sophomore Annika Hoffmann rowed starboard. The Wolverines also finished third in the second varsity eight at the NCAA Championships, while coming in fourth in the first varsity four. They wound up with 119 points, a Michigan record at the national regatta. That certainly loomed in striking distance of the national champion Huskies, who finished with 132. Texas grabbed second at 125, while Stanford (116), Ohio State (105) and California (103) finished behind the Wolverines. Michigan outperformed its seeding in the NCAA Championships, but that fact wasn't any comfort to Rothstein. "We didn't agree with the seeding, coming in," he stressed. "We felt we were faster. But it was a really tough field at the top. There were six teams that could have won the champion- ship. "Washington was not the favor- ite, and they ended up winning it and winning every event. They were seeded fourth in the first eight com- ing in." Looking back on the event, Roth- stein sounded pleased over all the components of Michigan's effort, in different degrees. "Our first eight, we really had our best race," he said. "We had the lead for most of the race. Of course, you look back, and you start thinking about your training, your recruiting and everything else. What if we had just a little more horsepower? We could have held on and won it. "But I was really happy with how they raced. They really did a great job." Others found the going a bit tougher, but stayed strong through various struggles. "Our second eight did not have their best race, but they're a really tough, strong boat," Rothstein assessed. "The goal is always to win, but they had a really good regatta. "Our four had been struggling a little bit through the regatta, hadn't really found a rhythm through the ear- lier races. They had their best race of the regatta, so I felt good about that boat as well." In the end, Rothstein sounded slightly wistful in his assessment of the finish, while acknowledging Michi- gan's overall sterling effort. "You go out, you row your best, do what you can and you can't play the what-if game too much, because it will drive you crazy," he said. Michigan's head coach for nearly two decades knew early on this would be a good crew. The Wolverines looked strong across the board, and selfless. "We really didn't have much sepa- ration," he said. "There wasn't a su- perstar. There weren't big gaps. It was really competitive. There was nobody who thought they were better than anybody else, and that led to a really cohesive team. That was the key to our success. "I had really good feelings about the team all the way back to the fall, as far as how it was functioning and train- ing. But you can have a great team and not necessarily have great perfor- mance, because things just don't quite click. "But having a great team really Head coach Mark Rothstein's team placed third at the NCAA Championships, claiming an NCAA trophy and podium finish for the second time in the last three seasons. PHOTO COURTESY MICHIGAN PHOTOGRAPHY