Syracuse wins 4 of 5 races at Lake Wheeler Invitational

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No. 15 Syracuse won the 2022 Lake Wheeler Invitational in Raleigh, North Carolina, on Saturday. The Orange placed first in the 16-team regatta, winning the Pocock Cup. Syracuse tallied 83 points, beating No. 11 Duke, No. 9 Penn and five other teams that had votes in the national rankings.

The Orange won 80% of their races on Saturday morning, which gave them nine wins in 15 races at the regatta. Syracuse’s second varsity 8 and second varsity 4 sped through their competition, winning every one of their three races during the event.

The varsity 8 defeated Louisville, Central Florida, North Carolina and Kansas. The second varsity 8 (6:42.81) came in first beating Louisville (6:50.59), UCF (6:51.87), Kansas (7:05.60) and North Carolina (7:08.18).

The varsity 4 (7:33.77) finished 11.6 seconds before Kansas (7:45.39), Louisville (7:47.15), UCF (7:50.38) and North Carolina (8:02.82), which came in third, fourth and fifth place, respectively. The Orange’s second varsity 4 (7:42.33) beat UCF, Penn, North Carolina and Kansas. In a close race, the third varsity 8 finished fourth, only 4.1 seconds away from first place UCF (7:19.52).

The Lake Wheeler Invitational, where more than 15 teams competed at the Lake Wheeler Park, was hosted by Duke and North Carolina. Some of the competing teams included Boston College, Bucknell, Georgetown, Kansas, Miami, North Carolina, Oklahoma and Temple.