"It was great to get the win," UCSD head coach Zach Johnson said. "Gonzaga has had our number the last few years and we expected a close race. It came down to a difference of about one second and it's been like that six of the last seven years I believe. They're still a fantastic team and we're pleased to get a win out of the race today."

The varsity eight boat won for the second week in a row after besting USD, UC Irvine, UC Santa Barbara, and Long Beach State at the UC San Diego Regatta. The same lineup competed this week with Michael Monrean, Nathan Morgan, Jay Dee Morgan, Justin Gordon, Drew Madden, Erik Smith, Joey Frank, and Ed Yragui and coxswain Cameran Biltucci.  UCSD finished with a time of 6:16.9 in the 2k race while racing against strong outgoing tide. Gonzaga posted a time of 6:18.2 and the Toreros finished at 6:27.9.

The second varsity eight boat of Shawn Kuo, Michael Verdone, Jon Seibert, Justin Hsu, Zach Sharfman, Billy Scherba, Alfred Tam, Kellen Mandehr, and Dan Hallisy finished finished as a runner-up after last week's victory. The group finished with 6:36.3, less than six seconds than the time of Gonzaga's winning boat in the race. The novice eight boat won with a time of 6:31.9, almost eight full seconds ahead of Gonzaga and nearly 15 seconds ahead of USD.

The Tritons now have two weeks off for finals before taking part in the San Diego Crew Classic, March 27-28, at Mission Bay.


"We're going to go back to the drawing board and try to improve on our performances today," Johnson said. "We're just trying to peak for the Copley Cup in a couple of weeks. We have finals week coming next week so that kind of throws a wrench in a little bit, but we'll be getting a lot of speed work in so that we're as ready as possible."

The San Diego Crew Classic is scheduled for a 7 a.m. start on Saturday, March 27.