TRIUMPHANT FALL PLACES CRIMSON NO. 1 IN THE COUNTRY

by John Veneziano

Second-best just isn't good enough for Harvard-Radcliffe sailing...even if it's second-best in the country.

After a superb 2000-01 season–which included a pair of runner-up showings at National Championships–the Crimson is moving up another notch this fall. A series of stellar efforts has boosted the Crimson co-eds to No. 1 in the latest ICSA national rankings.

As a team, Harvard has already won the Harry Anderson Trophy, the Captain Hurst Bowl, the Pine Trophy, and the Hoyt Trophy. Individually, junior Clay Bischoff (Miami, FL) won the New England Men's Single-handed Championship–hosted by Yale–and will race for the national title in late November. Also qualifying was senior Sean Doyle (St. Petersburg, FL), who took third. For the women, senior Margaret Gill (Weston, MA) will get the opportunity to defend her national title following a second-place finish at the New Englands. which took place on the Thames River.

"We have confidence and depth," said Head Coach Mike O'Connor. "And we've proven we can win major intersectionals with four different skippers. I don't know if there is another school in the country that could do that right now.

"Those wins right at the beginning of the season were a tremendous boost to us and I knew we had something special going on when we took third at the Danmark Trophy (at Coast Guard) and the kids came back not feeling good at all. This is a team determined to win."

In recent action, the A-Division tandem of Gill and Susan Bonney (Westford, MA) and the B-Division pairing of Cardwell Potts (New Orleans, LA) and Laura Knoll (Freedom, NH) both took second at the Hoyt Trophy, hosted by Brown. Those performances allowed the Crimson to outpoint 17 other schools to win the overall title.

Previously, Doyle teamed with Michelle Yu (Mountain View, CA) to capture A-Division at the Harry Anderson Trophy at Yale. Bischoff and Lema Kikuchi (Bethesda, MD) were similarly victorious in B-Division, giving the Crimson the sweep. Tufts was a distant second at the event, followed by Brown, and the host Elis.

The solo efforts of Bischoff, Doyle, and Gill have been equally impressive.

"Clay's single-handed game has been outstanding, and for Sean the New Englands were just a warm-up," praised O'Connor, noting that Nationals will take place on Doyle's home course in St. Petersburg. "And Margaret is only recently back from racing at the 470 World Championships in Slovenia, so she'll just continue to get better and better."

After these stellar early-season showings, the question might be just how much better can they get?