CHERRY HILL, N.J. – All three of Villanova's boats turned in fifth place finishes on Saturday morning at the Doc Hosea Invitational.

Racing finally got underway this morning after a lightning delay.

"I'm proud of our entire team and the intention they showed on the race course today.  They went out with a plan and executed it," Villanova head coach Carissa Adams said. "The growth of this team has been exciting to watch and they are fun to coach.  Our intentions going into the day were to gain knowledge about ourselves and to come out with a list of skills that we can improve to gain more speed for our conference championship.  We are on PACE."
 
Villanova's fastest boat of the day came in the Varsity Eight with Madison Girard, Erin Welch, Ellie Falk, Sheila Joyce, Kara Dempsey, Maggie Coyne, Olivia Krause, Alexandra Petrozzi and Madeline McCarthy falling into a tight battle for fourth with Bucknell. The Bison ended up edging the 'Cats 38-hundredths of a second with Villanova finishing behind them in 6:55.88.
 
The JV8 boat of Cate Donnelly, Caroline Shea, Jadyn Ramos, Julia Kreisl, Isabella Thorne, Olivia Frizzell, Jillian de Merlier, Anna Flynn and Caroline Colgan started the day by turning in a 7:07.35 time, finishing three seconds behind a fourth-place Bucknell squad.
 
The final boat on the water for Villanova was the 3V8. Gianna Zajac, Sabrina Pauli, Grace Quirk, Rose Baker, Cecilia Jenkins, Kelechi Onuigbo, Sofia Lopez, Sarah Robillard and Addison Wittnebert finished fifth in 7:42.18.
 
Villanova will be back in action in two weeks on the Cooper Rover once again, this time for the Knecht Cup. That two-day event is set to begin on April 15 from Cherry Hill, N.J.