Tufts coed sailing faced a challenging Saturday split between two marquee events, the NEISA Match Race Championship on Salem Sound outside Marblehead Harbor and the Danmark Trophy hosted by the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut.
In the opening round robin of the New England Match Race Championship, the Jumbos posted a 3-4 record to finish sixth out of eight teams. Tufts picked up wins against Coast Guard, Maine Maritime, and Bowdoin, while dropping contests to Brown, Yale, Boston University, and Dartmouth.
Seeded sixth heading into the quarterfinal knockout round, Tufts drew third-seeded Yale in what proved to be a tightly contested series. Yale took the opening race before the Jumbos leveled the match at 1-1. However, Yale prevailed in the decisive third race to eliminate Tufts from the championship.
The Tufts starting lineup for the match race championship was not available at the time of the original release. The semifinal round on Sunday will feature Brown against Coast Guard and Dartmouth against Yale, with the winners meeting to decide the NEISA Match Race title.
Meanwhile at the Danmark Trophy, five A division races and four B division races were completed on Saturday. Tufts accumulated scores of 70 in A division and 42 in B division for a combined total of 112, placing the Jumbos 16th overall.
Sophomore skipper Crue Ziskind and senior crew Reddin Kehrli have been the standout pairing, sitting 10th in B division after posting a sixth-place finish in the second B race of the day. In A division, senior skipper Wyatt Bischoff and junior crew Cici Priest are 18th overall, with their best result being a ninth-place finish in the fifth start.
Brown University holds the lead at the Danmark Trophy heading into Sunday with a commanding 37-24-61 scoring line. Racing is set to resume at 10 AM on Sunday as teams look to make their final push up the standings.
