Written by Chris Klevan, Photos by Ken Legler
In one of the most impressive showing this season, Hobart and William Smith Colleges dominated Sunday to win the America Trophy/ MAISA Conference Championship, hosted at Cornell University.
Cayuga Lake presented a home-like advantage for the neighboring HWS sailors. With no races outside the top-3 on Sunday, Freshman Hector Guzman with Maya Weber (‘20) and Adam Schafer (‘17), won B-Division by a whopping 22 points after 15 races. The standout performance from the B-Division team in conjunction with a well sailed regatta from Greiner Hobbs (‘18) and Anna Flaherty (‘20) sealed the deal for MAISA’s newest champion. If Guzman and company can replicate that effort in Charleston, the HWS team is a legitimate contender to take down the perennial favorite, Yale.
“It has been a while since our last America Trophy win,” said HWS Head Coach, Scott Iklé “It reminds us how special and important these events are to the athletes. These championships are hard to win. A championship title is a confirmation of hard work, commitment and dedication by a team. There are a lot of great teams in MAISA with rich histories, so to once again be included on the winner’s list of the America Trophy is a sense of accomplishment for all the past, present and future HWS sailors. It was a special weekend.”
“Sailing at Cornell is like sailing at home,” continued Iklé. “There is a strong tie between the teams and the programs have worked together to grow with each other’s help. This friendship extends back to the late 1990’s, so it was great to see the two teams working together to pull off the event. It was great to have almost the entire HWS team there at some time during the weekend cheering on their teammates, but more importantly working with their friends at Cornell to showcase college sailing in the Finger Lakes. Both teams took pride in running this regatta for their MAISA friends.
Senior, Patrick Snow won A-Division with Mary Morocco (‘19) and Brittany Slook (‘20) for the Naval Academy Midshipmen. #5 Navy finished second overall at the regatta, with 158 points.
Fordham finished 3rd with 196 points.
#9 Hobart and William Smith, #5 Navy, Fordham, #2 Georgetown, #10 George Washington, #16 St. Mary’s, Hampton, #19 ODU and Kings Point were the qualifying teams from MAISA and rounded up the top 9 accordingly.