Tufts Varsity Men Capture Bronze at the Snake Regatta

Zach Merchant was part of the third-place Varsity Eight

WORCESTER - The Tufts Men's Crew raced a full squad contingent at the Annual Head of the Snake Regatta on Saturday at Lake Quinsigamond. Tufts Varsity Men led the way with a bronze medal finish in the Varsity Eights competition, bested only by the Varsity Eights of Division I Holy Cross and DIII rival WPI in an 18-boat field.

The Jumbos were 15 seconds out of first place with a time of 14:15.6 and just edged out defending New England Champions Bates by one second, with the first boats of Colby, UMass, UNH and Middlebury trailing.  The Jumbos prioritized the Varsity Four next, and placed two even boats 15th and 16th in the eights event.

The third-place Varsity eight had Hannah Frankel, Zach Merchant, Zhuangchen Zhou, Tyler McCullough, Tyler Hagedorn, Chandler Glass, Jonathan Williams, Andrew MacMillen and Ryan Bell on board.

In the aforementioned Fours event Tufts placed fifth in the 19-boat field, trailing New England small boat stalwarts Bowdoin, URI, Colby and UMass. Tufts timed out 39 seconds behind the winners, consolation for the Polar Bear loss to the Tufts Football team later in the day. The Tufts boating was Maria Karam, Jonathan Lapadula, Andrew Warren, Matt Cohen and Jackson Horwitz.

The Jumbo walk-on novice crew had their first race ever, after four weeks and approximately 20 practices. The Jumbos acquitted themselves well, with the novice men sixth of 10.

Next weekend's Head of the Charles will see Tufts in action with Men's College Fours on Saturday and Men's College Eights on Sunday afternoon.