Author: Jimmy Sullivan

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in October 2019.

For the ninth time since 2000, the Washington Redskins are rearranging the deck chairs on the NFL’s equivalent of the Titanic.

Jay Gruden is out after just over five years of mediocrity and ultimate failure that yielded just one playoff appearance and 49 losses — the most of any coach in that time period. Bill Callahan, of Oakland Raiders and Nebraska Football fame, will be the team’s interim coach. At 0–5, the Redskins and owner Dan Snyder decided now was the time to make a change, as if Gruden’s firing will change the culture for one of the league’s most inept franchises.

Of course, Gruden’s dismissal will not do this. He was fired simply because someone needed to take the fall for organizational incompetence, just like Norv Turner, Steve Spurrier, Mike Shanahan and others before him. The more pressing matter for Washington now, in addition to finding a new head coach, will be to find a good match for rookie quarterback Dwayne Haskins, who has only played in one NFL game but has already had a tumultuous stint in Washington.

The Redskins took Haskins with the 15th pick of this year’s draft, and he was considered by many to be the second-best quarterback in the draft, behind Oklahoma’s Kyler Murray. The problem is that, according to a recent Washington Post report, Gruden didn’t want him and, even worse, Haskins figured that out. From this point of view, the firing of Gruden may have saved Haskins’ career, which is a wild statement to make until you consider the Redskins’ record with quarterbacks as of late.

This brings us to the real point here. We may look back at this five years from now and laugh because Haskins may have turned into one of the best quarterbacks in the league. The point? Player development is non-linear, and we shouldn’t expect instant gratification from all because a select few are able to provide it.

The Washington Redskins know this all too well. In the 2012 draft, Washington took Baylor signal-caller Robert Griffin III with the second pick after the Colts took Stanford QB Andrew Luck with the first selection. Debates raged throughout the season as to who was better. Griffin was named Offensive Rookie of the Year after amassing just over 4,000 total yards and dragging the team to its first NFC East title since 1999. However, RGIII tore his ACL and LCL in Washington’s playoff loss to Seattle and was never the same.

Luck hung it up this past August after persistent injuries over the past half-decade. Both were outlasted as starters by a trio of third and fourth-round picks — Russell Wilson, Nick Foles and Kirk Cousins — and all three have been to at least one Pro Bowl.

But Griffin and Luck had instant success in the NFL before leaving us to ponder what could have been. There have been plenty of examples of late bloomers who have succeeded after initial setbacks thanks to improvements in their environment and abilities.

Rams quarterback Jared Goff had a horrific first-year under mediocre head coach Jeff Fisher. Goff took off when Sean McVay was hired — ironically, from the Redskins — before year two. While Goff appears to have taken a step back in year four, two straight playoff berths and a Super Bowl appearance didn’t seem possible at this time in 2016.

There have been plenty of others, as well. Drew Brees went 10–17 in his first two years as an NFL starter. Troy Aikman, who went on to win three Super Bowls as the Cowboys’ starting QB in the ’90s, threw more interceptions than touchdowns in the first four years of his career. And Peyton Manning, possibly the greatest statistical quarterback in the history of the league, led the league in interceptions with 28 in his 1998 rookie season.

Much of their eventual success can be owed to the environment around them: Manning, for example, got to work with renowned offensive coordinator Tom Moore for the first 12 years of his career and the two gelled after that rough rookie campaign. Aikman’s offensive coordinator, the aforementioned Norv Turner, helped guide him to three of his best years from 1991–1993. Brees, of course, revitalized his career with the help of Saints head coach Sean Payton, and the two now comprise the league’s second-longest quarterback-coach combination behind the Patriots’ Tom Brady and Bill Belichick.

So what’s the point of all this? Dwayne Haskins may struggle off the bat. He’s expected to get his shot to start on Sunday against the lowly Dolphins in a game one of the teams might win. In his first career appearance against the Giants on Sept. 29, Haskins threw 17 passes. Nine were completed, five hit the ground and three were caught by players on the other team. One would hope, against one of the worst teams the league has ever seen and without the coach who didn’t want him, that there’s nowhere to go but up from here.

But if Dwayne Haskins doesn’t significantly improve, don’t freak out. Success as an NFL quarterback is not cut-and-dried, and there are plenty of ups and downs along the way. A failure in 2019 doesn’t mean he’ll be a failure for the rest of his career.

There have been plenty of quarterbacks, including some of the best the league has ever seen. who were doubted the same way Haskins is now. They turned out okay, and, while Haskins may not be a Hall of Famer, he can too.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in October 2019.

The ultimate distinguisher between the “haves” and “have-nots” in baseball — the playoffs — will have started by the time you read this.

Ten teams — the Nationals, Brewers, Rays, Athletics, Cardinals, Braves, Dodgers, Yankees, Twins and Astros — will compete for a championship on the national stage. Four of those ten teams won 100 games, a number that was traditionally considered a high-water mark for greatness over a six-month season. Houston and Los Angeles, in another harbinger of their dominance, won their respective divisions by ten or more games.

However, when you see such dominant play on the top end of the spectrum, you know that equal futility exists on the opposite end of the spectrum. Baseball is no different.

We say this because, for the four teams that won over 100 games, four others — the Orioles, Tigers, Royals and Marlins — lost over 100. For its part, Major League Baseball has tried to take steps to discourage “tanking,” which, in sports parlance, has come to mean the systematic or intentional losing of games in order to benefit a team’s chances of winning in the future.

One of these steps is the so-called “luxury tax,” which severely penalizes teams for spending lavishly on their players. MLB’s luxury tax threshold will climb to $210 million in 2021. Moreover, this luxury tax has absolutely no effect on the four teams I just mentioned because they possess an average payroll of just over $75 million.

But here’s the real problem with tanking: when done right, it works.

One of 2019’s 100-win teams, the Astros, lost an average of 108 games from 2011-13. The team was, to put it politely, an embarrassment. However, Houston’s saving grace during this period was having a top-two pick for five straight drafts, a feat that even the Cleveland Browns would be proud of. With these selections, Houston chose players such as Carlos Correa, George Springer and Alex Bregman. Bregman and Springer are both in the American League MVP discussion after having career years.

Other assets from outside the organization include pitchers Justin Verlander and Gerrit Cole, both of whom were acquired with assets the Astros picked up in the time period in which they were tanking. One of the two right-handed hurlers will win the 2019 American League Cy Young Award.

Point being, without one of the worst three-year stretches in the history of sports, the Astros would not have put themselves in position to win their second championship in three years. Of course, we’ve also seen tanking go wrong — just look at the NFL’s Miami Dolphins, who may not win a game this season and whose best players reportedly want out of “the process.”

Why, however, would you have such a moral aversion to tanking when you see its potential?

It likely traces back to our upbringings. Whether you played a sport or not, you were always taught that winning was good and losing was bad. An “A” on your next test far exceeded an “F.”

Doing a good job was always better than doing a bad one. All of these things are true, but as we grew up, we found out that things weren’t so black and white. Ironically, the clarity between winning and losing, succeeding and failing, is a big reason why so many people, including myself, love sports. The scoreboard never, ever lies.

But sometimes in life, you have to go down to shoot back up. You have to hit rock bottom before you can hit new heights. Sports is the same way, but watching your team lose for years on end as ownership tells you to “be patient” and “look to the future” is painful. That’s why we don’t like tanking, even though it can work.

Let’s stay in baseball for another example. At the MLB trade deadline, the Arizona Diamondbacks, despite dealing star first baseman Paul Goldschmidt to the St. Louis Cardinals in the offseason, were just 3.5 games out of a playoff spot at an astonishingly average 54–55. Instead of loading up for a possible run to a playoff spot, Arizona traded the hottest commodity on the market, starter Zack Greinke, to the Astros for four prospects.

Arizona’s general manager, Mike Hazen, said that his team wasn’t in a great position to win the World Series, with a 10-team playoff format, a wild card game to get through and a tough Dodgers team waiting on the other side of the one-game playoff.

On the other hand, my beloved New York Mets were behind Arizona in the standings and went in the other direction, trading two highly-regarded prospects for Blue Jays starter Marcus Stroman.

Are the Mets definitively better-positioned for the future than the Diamondbacks? They may be, but neither made the playoffs. Only one team “tried,” but both teams achieved the same result and Arizona finished just one game behind New York. And the Diamondbacks have four prospects to show for it while the Mets have a depleted farm system from a calendar year’s worth of pushing their chips to the center of baseball’s table.

So if your team is tanking, don’t sweat it. There’s a method to the madness, born out of precedent and probabilities, that makes it more likely than not that the process will pay off.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in September 2019.

Fordham’s men’s and women’s cross country teams took part in the Paddy Doyle Invitational this past week at Van Cortlandt Park right here in the Bronx. The men’s team earned a fifth-place finish while the women finished the event in seventh place out of 16 teams.

Fordham senior and defending Atlantic 10 champion Ryan Kutch made his first appearance of the season and completed the 8K course in a time of just over 25 minutes, which left him just outside the top ten in the event. After Kutch crossed the line, sophomore Brandon Hall followed close behind in a 17th-place time of 25:32.3. Senior Nicholas Raefski also earned a top-30 finish with his 26th-place time of 25:53.7.

Fordham also had five other competitors in the event. In addition to Kutch, Hall and Raefski, other Fordham finishers included freshman John McGovern (33rd–26:01), freshman Colin Flood (41st–26:12.5), senior Sean Sullivan (58th–27:07.0), freshman Jack Craven (27:15.2) and first-year runner Nick Lundberg (79th–27:25.2). The men’s team was able to earn a top-five finish, as the Rams came in behind Iona, Charlotte, Temple and Columbia.

The women’s team had a similar performance on Friday.

The Rams were led by freshman Alexandra Thomas, who had an extremely impressive showing in the 5K race. Thomas was the first Fordham woman to cross the finish line, and she did so in a 16th-place time of 18:32.6. In her first competition since the Stony Brook Season Opener on Aug. 31, senior Sydney Snow crossed the finish line in 19:11.2, which was good for a 42nd-place showing. Fordham was able to get two freshmen in the top 50 on this morning, as Taylor Mascetta joined Thomas in placing 49th with a time of 19:29.4.

There were several other competitors for the Rams on the women’s side. Other scorers included sophomore Bridget Alex (19:35.3), freshmen Sarah Rubenheimer (20:11.1) and juniors Dana Baggins (20:33.4) and Maeve O’Connor (21:49.5).

In the team competition, the Fordham women finished seventh out of 16 teams, finishing behind Columbia, Cornell, La Salle, Johns Hopkins, Temple and Charlotte.

The Paddy Doyle Invitational concluded a stretch of four competitions in four weeks for Fordham Cross Country. The Rams will take next weekend off before resuming their season on Oct. 5 at the Paul Short Invitational in Bethlehem, Pa. That tournament will be hosted by Lehigh and will mark the first tournament Fordham competes in outside the tri-state area this season.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in September 2019.

Both the Fordham men’s and women’s cross country teams competed at this weekend’s NYIT Invitational, hosted by the New York Institute of Technology, in Old Westbury, N.Y. The men’s team raked in a second-place finish, trailing only Seton Hall, while the women finished fourth behind Seton Hall, St. Thomas Aquinas and USMMA.

On the men’s side, the team was led by junior William Whelan, who finished seventh in the 8K race with a time of 23:34.26. Fordham finished in each position seventh through tenth, as three of Whelan’s teammates — freshman Ryan Fahey (23:52.48), junior Patrick Norako (23:52.78) and junior Dylan Serino (23:56.72) — rounded out the top 10. Also competing for the Rams was sophomore Patrick Tuohy, who finished the race in a time of 24:17.75, good for 17th place in the event.

“As a runner for over seven years, it always feels great when your summer training starts to pay off,” Whelan says. “I knew going into the NYIT Invitational I was one of the fastest runners, and I could score low for Fordham. Placing seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth is a great sign, but the competitiveness in me thinks we could have been lower.”

Moving over to the women’s team, sophomore Bridget Alex had her second straight solid performance, crossing the finish line before of any other female Ram in 20:09.85. Junior Bridget White placed 19th in 21:29.06 while sophomores Jill Jones and Angelica Piccini finished 27th and 28th, respectively, with times of just over 22 minutes. Junior Julia Herms also placed for Fordham, crossing the finish line in a time of 22:18.65.

This was the second event of the regular season for the Rams, after last week’s Fordham Fiasco, in which both the men’s and women’s teams came in fifth place. Fordham will have a return home of sorts this coming week, as the Rams will compete in the Paddy Doyle Invitational this coming Friday; however, Fordham will not be hosting. Instead, Iona College will be hosting the event, even though it will be held here in the Bronx, at Van Cortlandt Park.

“We are a strong group of athletes, and starting this cross-country season, we have been holding each other more accountable for small things like stretching, core and other important priorities that may be overlooked,” Whelan says. “With that being said, running more tight as a pack during workouts may give us very similar feel to when it comes time to race, and when the time comes to race, we will used to seeing, pacing and running next to each other, whether ahead or behind, and start to pick off other runners.”

Fordham will look forward to doing that this Friday.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in September 2019.

Evan Jaenichen, FCRH `20, will be leaving Fordham in May with a very different career path than the one he envisioned a couple of years ago.

Jaenichen, originally from Long Island, wasn’t exactly sure what he wanted to do entering college. He initially wanted to become a physician’s assistant or physical therapist.

He planned on joining the pre-med program but decided against it because he knew he ultimately wouldn’t be interested.
“I had worked with a physical therapist that summer, and while I enjoyed it at times, it was not something I could have seen myself pursuing,” Jaenichen says.

So, in his sophomore year, Jaenichen was back at square one. In February 2018, he chose new media and digital design as his major, but he still didn’t know what he wanted to do or where he wanted to go with said major.

He took a philosophical ethics class his senior year and happened to meet Charlie Maisano, FCRH `20, who is currently the sports manager at WFUV.

The two became friends, and Jaenichen wandered into a new passion in just about the last way you could imagine: watching a Mets game on his laptop. “Charlie and I talked, and eventually he told me about all of the cool stuff WFUV students get to do, which I never really knew about. So I basically said, ‘What the hell!’ and signed up for the trainee program the following semester, since it sort of pertained to my major and I love sports.”
Armed with this knowledge and sudden change of direction, Jaenichen got to work, involving himself in podcasts, beat reporting and production at the station.

Soon, he became a WFUV beat reporter for NYCFC, one of two local Major League Soccer teams. He also got involved in video training at the station and, due to his proficiency in that medium, was named WFUV Sports’ video coordinator this past April.

In the span of less than a year, he went from questioning his future to creating it.

“I would have to say that the most rewarding part of working there is the process of completing a daunting project, and then getting to see the final product,” he says. “The station has made me more of a perfectionist, and in many rights, I attribute that to both Charlie and Bob [Ahrens, WFUV Sports’ executive producer.] I’m sure most students would say the same about working on any project with Bob Ahrens however, the end product is very rewarding. And you get to learn so much!”

One of those daunting projects was a July trip to Cooperstown, N.Y., where he got to witness the Baseball Hall of Fame induction of former Yankees closer Mariano Rivera, the first unanimous inductee in the Hall’s history. His latest undertaking is videography for Fordham Football, posting highlights of the game along with WFUV’s radio calls.

Jaenichen is having a good time with what he is doing right now, but in eight months, he’ll be launched into the real world with the rest of the class of 2020. No matter how accomplished your college career is, graduating is bound to come with anxiety and concern. Nonetheless, Jaenichen has a far better idea of what he wants to do than he did just over a year ago.

“After graduation, I would love to work in sports in pretty much any capacity,” he says. “One thing that I have really found a passion for is video production, especially special projects that involve a degree of thinking and foresight. In that respect, it would be really cool to work somewhere that I can be creative with video production, or even just be involved in live production, as it is also a kind of art in its own right.”

No matter what he does, the senior just wants to have fun and be happy. “Overall, I am just looking for something I can find enjoyment out of,” Jaenichen says.

Jaenichen has found his direction and his passion. He has come a long way from watching the Mets in philosophical ethics.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in September 2019.

It is no secret that in sports, most coaches and managers would rather follow the herd.

In basketball, teams trudged their way through 84–82 games until a coach like Don Nelson pioneered a run-and-gun offense with the Warriors and Mavericks in the 90s and 2000s. Baseball managers refused to acknowledge advanced analytics until those same numbers spearheaded teams like the Rays and A’s to success in the mid-to-late-2000s.

Football has not yet seen that evolution, and the game could use a Billy Beane, Joe Maddon or Don Nelson.

What I’m referring to is the archaic in-game management of the vast majority of coaches at the professional level. Here’s an example that comes by way of new Cardinals coach Kliff Kingsbury, who was hailed for his advanced offensive tactics and avant-garde attitudes towards an evolving game when he was hired in January. None of this actually mattered because, more importantly, Kingsbury was friends with 33-year-old Rams coach Sean McVay, who all NFL teams with a coaching vacancy were trying to clone last offseason.

That makes what happened in Sunday’s Cardinals-Ravens game all the more bizarre.

The game turned into a competitive battle between two of the game’s most promising young quarterbacks, Arizona’s Kyler Murray and Baltimore’s Lamar Jackson. While Jackson slightly outdueled Murray, Arizona had plenty of chances to steal a win and move to 1-0-1 against the defending AFC North champions.

Instead, Kingsbury swallowed those chances. Cardinals kicker Zane Gonzalez kicked three field goals with his team inside the five-yard-line, and two of those field goals came with two or fewer yards needed to get a first down. Kingsbury also punted on his own 44-yard-line with a fourth-and-one early in the first half instead of going for it. In summation, Kingsbury cost his team an opportunity at 15 points. The Cardinals lost by just six. Kingsbury’s offense, which is not one of the more explosive ones in the league, has averaged 5.4 yards per play in its first two games, meaning it could likely muster the necessary yardage to convert in those situations in which he chose to punt and kick field goals.

According to Stats LLC, the Cardinals’ inept decision-making on Sunday was also historic; Arizona became the first team in over 30 years to kick three field goals inside the five-yard-line while losing. Kingsbury was hired to be an advanced thinker, but his thinking was just the opposite on Sunday, and it may well have cost his team a victory.

Let’s look at the other end of the spectrum and examine what happens when coaches play to win instead of not to lose.

Eagles coach Doug Pederson has burnished a reputation as being one of the most aggressive fourth-down coaches in the league. His team has been among the top two in the league each of his three full years as Philadelphia’s head coach, and he once again played smartly and aggressively against the Falcons on Sunday night. His offense was faced with a fourth-and-goal from four yards outside the goal line in the third quarter, but instead of ending a third-straight trip to the red zone with a disappointing field goal, Pederson went for it. His quarterback, Carson Wentz, found wide receiver Nelson Agholor in the back of the end zone for six points instead of three. The play increased the Eagles’ win probability by 8.9%, while a field goal would not have had the same effect.

While the Eagles eventually lost the game, they didn’t play not to lose. Pederson stuck to his guns, and, despite the team’s ultimate failure, its head coach won’t have too many decision-making regrets about how the game transpired.

The flock of NFL coaches says that you should avoid risks like the one Pederson took on Sunday unless they are absolutely necessary. Many in the coaching community, which has progressed on this issue in the last few years, would likely side with Kingsbury’s logic in taking the sure points.

This also points to another issue with the hiring and firing practices of NFL teams, particularly when it comes to their head coaches. While risk is not necessarily always rewarded, it should be at least respected when it comes to game strategy and hiring a new head coach. Kingsbury was thought of as a “risk-taker,” which is a notion he quickly disproved in week two. He never earned this reputation; rather, it arose from who he knew and other characteristics like his age (39) and background, which included coaching future NFL quarterbacks like Davis Webb and Patrick Mahomes at Texas Tech.

So when you watch the next slate of NFL games, whether it’s this coming week or in the future, look at the decisions certain coaches are making. Then, remember this: while they may think they are, not all of the league’s 32 head honchos are coaching to win.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in September 2019.

Both the Fordham men’s and women’s cross country teams competed at this weekend’s NYIT Invitational, hosted by the New York Institute of Technology, in Old Westbury, N.Y. The men’s team raked in a second-place finish, trailing only Seton Hall, while the women finished fourth behind Seton Hall, St. Thomas Aquinas and USMMA.

On the men’s side, the team was led by junior William Whelan, who finished seventh in the 8K race with a time of 23:34.26. Fordham finished in each position seventh through tenth, as three of Whelan’s teammates — freshman Ryan Fahey (23:52.48), junior Patrick Norako (23:52.78) and junior Dylan Serino (23:56.72) — rounded out the top 10. Also competing for the Rams was sophomore Patrick Tuohy, who finished the race in a time of 24:17.75, good for 17th place in the event.

“As a runner for over seven years, it always feels great when your summer training starts to pay off,” Whelan says. “I knew going into the NYIT Invitational I was one of the fastest runners, and I could score low for Fordham. Placing seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth is a great sign, but the competitiveness in me thinks we could have been lower.”

Moving over to the women’s team, sophomore Bridget Alex had her second straight solid performance, crossing the finish line before of any other female Ram in 20:09.85. Junior Bridget White placed 19th in 21:29.06 while sophomores Jill Jones and Angelica Piccini finished 27th and 28th, respectively, with times of just over 22 minutes. Junior Julia Herms also placed for Fordham, crossing the finish line in a time of 22:18.65.

This was the second event of the regular season for the Rams, after last week’s Fordham Fiasco, in which both the men’s and women’s teams came in fifth place. Fordham will have a return home of sorts this coming week, as the Rams will compete in the Paddy Doyle Invitational this coming Friday; however, Fordham will not be hosting. Instead, Iona College will be hosting the event, even though it will be held here in the Bronx, at Van Cortlandt Park.

“We are a strong group of athletes, and starting this cross-country season, we have been holding each other more accountable for small things like stretching, core and other important priorities that may be overlooked,” Whelan says. “With that being said, running more tight as a pack during workouts may give us very similar feel to when it comes time to race, and when the time comes to race, we will used to seeing, pacing and running next to each other, whether ahead or behind, and start to pick off other runners.”

Fordham will look forward to doing that this Friday.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in August 2019.

The 2018 season was a historic one for the Fordham cross country team.

The year saw several historic performances, led by then-junior Ryan Kutch and senior Angelina Grebe. Kutch became the first Ram runner ever to win the Atlantic 10 championship in October while both Kutch and Grebe made it to the all-Atlantic 10 team at season’s end. Additionally, the women’s cross country team finished with a program-best third-place finish at the Atlantic 10 championship.

However, 2019 is a new season, and with it have come some significant changes.

The biggest difference between 2018 and 2019 for the Rams is at coach, as Tom Dewey retired over the summer after 39 years at the helm of the program. Stepping into his place is former assistant coach and recruiting coordinator Brian Horowitz, who had been one of Dewey’s assistants since 2013. The move is an adjustment for the Rams, but the team’s familiarity with Horowitz should ease the transition.

“It is going to be a big adjustment just because of what coach Dewey brought to the team with his experience, knowledge and coaching ability,” Kutch says. “However, coach Horowitz has done a great job as an assistant and the whole team is confident he will do equally as well as a head coach.”
Kutch is returning for his senior year having reached the pinnacle of achievement last season. That being said, he and his coach are still focused on improvement despite all of his achievements last year.

“Ryan has been very consistent over the past three years,” Horowitz says. “His consistency has led to continuous progression in performances each year. We hope to continue to take the next step and have Ryan compete against the other top distance runners in the country.”

Kutch will lead the men’s team with other solid returners, including sophomore Brandon Hall and senior Sean Sullivan. On the women’s side, the team will be led by seniors Katia Krzyzanowski and Sydney Snow, both of whom will be captains for the coming season. The former has a strong 17th-place showing at last year’s Atlantic 10 Tournament while Snow anchored the team’s ECAC champion 4×800 team.

The team will also get reinforcements in newcomers like John McGovern, Colin Flood and Nick Lundberg, all three of whom finished in the top 11 in the New Jersey Meet of Champions last year. On the women’s side, freshman standouts include Alexandra Thomas, Taylor Mascetta and Sarah Rubenheimer. Thomas and Mascetta both placed in the top six at various events in their respective state meets this past season.

“The conference is very tough and deep in the team competition,” Horowitz says. “But we see ourselves as a threat and look to compete along with the other top teams in the conference.”

The conference should be deep and competitive this year. So should these Rams.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in August 2019.

The 2018-19 season saw several scintillating achievements for Fordham’s swimming and diving team.

On the women’s side, the team pulled in a third-place finish at the Atlantic 10 Championship in February in Geneva, Ohio. Multiple school records were broken, including the 50, 100 and 200 freestyle. The star of the swim team was senior Tara Brunner, who had a hand in breaking three of those Fordham swimming records. However, Fordham’s top performers last season weren’t necessarily upperclassmen.

Sophomore Caitlin McNary made first-team Atlantic 10 with her performance in the 500 freestyle, and she returns for her junior year this season. Then-junior Theresa Mullen returns after being a part of three all-Atlantic 10 relays.

Over on the diving side, the return of one standout performer should give the team hope for another excellent season.

Current senior Molly Dunn competed at the NCAA Zone Diving Competition on March 12 in Annapolis, Md. Dunn qualified for this tournament after a fourth-place finish in the one-meter dive at the conference championship the month before. The North Attleboro, Mass. native will look to add to her already-impressive resume in 2019-20.

On the men’s side, the team will look to rebound from an up-and-down campaign. Freshman recruits such as Nicholas Chao, Evan Fenska, Wade Meaders, Luka Mikadze, Ethan Murray, Nicolas Trichery and Kavin Weerasinghe will look to invigorate the program with new life and improved results. The team stands to improve after finishing last out of eight teams at February’s Atlantic 10 Championships. However, not all was lost last season; the team showed its potential by surging to blowout victories over Fairfield and Manhattan, which were followed by a close victory over local rival Iona.

The men’s team did lose several key pieces to graduation, such as captain Travis Monahan. However, many of the team’s most exciting athletes from last year, including seniors Christopher Sleutjes and Greg Lombana, juniors Scott Stern and Danny McGowan and sophomore A.J. Frakes, among others, are returning for the coming season. That return rate should lead to a marked improvement starting this fall for head coach Steve Potsklan and his team.

Fordham Swimming and Diving saw some great performances last season, particularly on the women’s side. This season, the task will be to match, if not exceed, those historic performances and improve on what was an excellent 2018-19 season.

This team, on both the men’s and women’s sides, has the pieces to get it done.

This article originally appeared in The Fordham Ram in August 2019.

It may have taken longer than anticipated, but Fordham Rowing showed what it was capable of as the 2018–19 season neared its conclusion.
The truest indicator of this performance was a share of a third-place showing at the Atlantic 10 Championships in May. After the regatta was completed, three Rams—­­­seniors Erin Parker and Caroline Roncinske, along with current junior Aleksa Bjornson—were named to the all-Atlantic 10 team.

“We had a rough start to the beginning of the season but we managed to come together and prove to ourselves what we are capable of as a team,” Bjornson said.

In 2019-20, the team will look to rebound after losing Parker and Roncinske, two of its main leaders. Other losses to graduation include Noelle Chaney, Danielle Kosman, Cynthia Luz, Emma Spoldi, Erin Stepka and Sarah White. The team, led by 28th-year head coach Ted Bonanno, will look to offset these losses with a fresh batch of recruits and improvement from athletes on the current roster.

Consistency was another issue for the team last year, and one that the Rams will have to correct if they want to become the class of the Atlantic 10. Bonanno has had experience with nationally-regarded team; according to Fordham Athletics, Bonanno’s crews have won a combined 17 national championships.

“Improving consistency will be our main focus; aiming to start strong and end strong,” Bjornson says. “Having high expectations for ourselves combined with a large incoming class of freshmen recruits will hopefully lead to strong finishes at our fall regattas.”

“In terms of improving, our key element is for all our rowers to continue to develop both technically and physically,” head coach Ted Bonanno said. “Last year more than half our squad did but some key rowers did not, mainly due to injuries. We look forward to keeping everyone healthy and hopefully free from injury.”

In terms of that development from last season, Bonanno cited senior Erika Selakowski, sophomore Lizzie Kerrigan, senior Brikena Prendaj, junior Anna Grace Cole and Elizabeth Berejka as rowers who made significant strides over the course of the season.

“Our goals for this season are lofty,” Bonanno says. After finishing third in the A-10 Conference last season, we are looking to move up and challenge for the championship.”

Fordham had an extremely successful season last year, but the Rams believe they are capable of achieving even more. If they are able to start this season as well as they finished last year, chances are they’ll be right.