Up and coming crew

Women's rowing may be the least-known USC sport

By JASON MARGOLIS
Staff Writer

Irelative anonymity, Coach George Jenkins is breeding a new tradition of athletic excellence at USC. Jenkins is the coach of USC's varsity women's rowing team - a group of athletes who Jenkins said is poised to make a splash in the NCAA Championships for the second consecutive year.
The team consists of two boats of eight and a boat of four, and is led by senior Kasey Ryan, the daughter of former Trojan offensive guard Mike Ryan.
With a tough racing schedule ahead, the team is ready to embark on a journey that it hopes will end in its first NCAA Rowing Championship.
Although USC has had an active women's rowing program on campus since the early 1970s, it has been only in the last few years that they have engaged in intercollegiate competition.
Last season, in the second-ever NCAA championships, USC sent a four-person boat to the competition and came back with a thrilling victory in that event.
This season, the Women of Troy hope to challenge the University of Washington for the overall national title, bringing an end to the Huskies' reign atop the collegiate rowing world (they own the only two NCAA championships).
With that said, the question remains: Where did this all of this come from?
Six years ago there were no scholarships available to women rowers, no paid coaches and no national tournament. Today, the sport is undergoing an absolute explosion, adding 10 Division I teams per season. Just this year, Notre Dame, Clemson, Duke and San Diego State have joined the ranks, and it is rumored that UCLA will be returning next season.
Women's rowing is one of the only sports that has more college participants than high school players, making it that rare sport where walk-ons have a legitimate chance of making an immediate impact. That fact, along with a scholarship capability second only to Trojan football, has made USC an active player in this resurgence.
Some of the current rowers didn't come to USC planning to be on the crew team.
"I was working as a lifeguard at the Lyon Center when an assistant coach said that ŒI looked like a rower,'" Ryan said. "I trained hard and was rewarded for my work with a scholarship and with last year's unprecedented success. We had no expectation that we would perform as well as we did.
"We intend to improve even further this season. Washington may still be the best in the Pac-10, but I feel that we are definitely a close second."
The team trains year-round and last Saturday dominated UC Irvine and UC Santa Barbara in the Trojan Erg Sprints held at the Lyon Center.
Erg sprints are not races, but more like what would be called time trials in which participants are striving to better their own previous times.
"Based on what we have done so far, we feel that we should do at least as well as we did last year," Ryan said. "Hopefully we will do even better. It would be great to have a full boat at the championships this year."
In addition to Ryan, the team returns coxswains Lisa Bartoli and Ivelina Boteva. Boteva was recently named the fastest in the world after her phenomenal times on the rowing machines.
Add to Boteva a top-notch recruiting class and Jenkins said this team is ready to enter the glare of the national spotlight.
"We think we are a lot stronger all-around team this year," Jenkins said. "Based on our performance in the fall Head Races we feel we have a top 10 boat. It should be a very exciting season."
More than ever before, Jenkins is encouraging great fan support. On Mar. 6, the Women of Troy will go head-to-head against San Diego State at the Port of Los Angeles, their last major tuneup before the San Diego Crew Classic.
With heightened expectations, and the memory of last year's success still fresh in its minds, the women's rowing team is looking forward to the challenge.
"Only 15 boats make the trip to the NCAA Championships," Jenkins said. "If we want to be there, we need to perform every time out. I think we're ready to make it happen."

Copyright 1999 by the Daily Trojan. All rights reserved.
This article was published in Vol. 136, No. 07 (Tuesday, January 26, 1999), beginning on page 20 and ending on page 18.