The St. Mary’s College of Maryland sailing team headed to Austin, Texas last week with hopes of adding to the program’s tally of 15 national championships. The 2012 Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association (ICSA) National Sailing Championships were co-hosted by the University of Texas and Austin Yacht Club on Lake Travis from May 30 to June 8. St. Mary’s placed second in the APS/ICSA Team Race National Championship and fourteenth in the Sperry Top-Sider/ICSA Women’s Championship.
St. Mary’s narrowly missed winning the program’s sixth Team Race National Championship, losing the deciding final race. The Seahawks finished in second place in a field of fourteen teams with a 10-7 record. Sailing in this championship for St. Mary’s were skippers Joshua Greenslade, Victor Diaz de Leon, and John Wallace, and crew Kayla McComb, Kelley Merryman, Katie Gluskin, and Ben Lezin.
The top fourteen collegiate teams in the country gathered to compete for the Annapolis Performance Sailing/ICSA Team Racing National Championship. The first part of the regatta narrowed the field from fourteen teams to a “gold round” of the top eight teams. After the gold group completed a double round-robin, the top four teams advanced to a final round to determine the champion. Joining the Seahawks in this year’s final four were Boston College, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, and the College of Charleston.
The championship came down to the final match of the regatta between the Seahawks and the College of Charleston. St. Mary’s had a good start and held an early advantage but Charleston grabbed the lead at the first mark of the race and held on until the finish.
St. Mary’s also competed in the Sperry Top-Sider/ICSA Women’s Championship, held May 30 – June 2. Semifinals on May 30 – 31 selected nine semifinalist teams to compete against nine teams that had earned their berths at district qualifiers earlier in the season. St. Mary’s tied with Eckerd College for eighth place in the semifinals, allowing them a berth in the national championship finals, in which the Seahawks finished 14th in a field of eighteen teams. Sailing for St. Mary’s were Kayla McComb and Nicole DeAngeli in A division and Catherine Shanahan, Alison Shane, and Nina Rabin in B division.
At the season-ending awards banquet in Austin, junior skipper Joshua Greenslade was named an Honorable Mention All-American by the ICSA. Greenslade capped an outstanding year by helping the Seahawks to a second place finish at the ICSA/ APS Team Race National Championship. Greenslade’s recognition brings the total number of Seahawk sailors with All-American honors to over 150 since 1993.