GAINESVILLE, GA (May 29, 2026) -- The Tufts University women's rowing team etched itself into the record books as one of the most dominant teams in NCAA Championship history on Friday afternoon, winning its third straight NCAA Championship in action from Lake Lanier Olympic Park.
For the second straight season, the Jumbos first and second varsity eights dominated all four races they competed in at the NCAA Championships. With impending weather moving Saturday's racing to Friday, the Jumbos were forced to race twice on both the 1V8+ and 2V8+ sides in the same day.
The truncated time table was no match for the Jumbos, who matched last year's dominant performance of 56 points with the pair of victories. Over the last three seasons, Tufts 1V8+ won its third straight at the national meet, while the Jumbos second varsity also repeated as national champs. Bates College was second with 45 points, while William Smith College earned third place with 44 points.
The first race of the day was for the 2V8+ in the first heat of the day, as the Jumbos' boat led by coxswain of
Maddie Rosato and stroke
Erica Wayland, cruised to an open water win over William Smith with a time of 6:40.139. It was over nine seconds faster than the Herons in the heat, while besting Bates by over 17 seconds.
Three races later at 7:46 AM, the Jumbos top boat was in the water for its first attempt of the day, and the first varsity for Tufts put down the word that it would be the boat to beat Friday. The Jumbos cruised to a six-second victory over William Smith in the heat, while besting Williams College by over eight seconds.
The worry with early dominance in the heats on a day when you have to race twice was how would the Jumbos respond coming back less than eight hours later. It proved to be no problem for the defending champions.
In the 2V8+ Grand Final, the Jumbos boat of Rosato, Wayland,
Katherine Tombaugh,
Zenani Himlin-Mayekiso,
Celia Carson,
Sam Dodds,
Claire Carson,
Lecia Sun and
Sonja Wartman never trailed. Tufts led by two seconds at the 500m mark, and slowly and surely extended that lead up to four seconds by the 1500m mark.
Williams and William Smith would charge down the stretch, and despite a late crab for the Jumbos, Tufts was able to cross the finish line with a time of 6:35.056 to earn the second varsity crown and 16 points for the Jumbos total.
That set up the Grand Final in the 1V8+, where Tufts was looking for its third straight championship and third under the direction of legendary coxswain
Hannah Jiang. Wasting no time getting out to lead, Tufts led by more than two seconds at the 500m marker. Using power and experience, the Jumbos held that lead the rest of the way while crossing the line by 4.31 seconds for the win.
The boat of Jiang, stroke
Rose Tinkjian,
Sami Haynes,
Josie Monroe,
Sydney Barr,
Sonia Haynes,
Aubyn Mackey,
Saskia Petitt and
Emma Lyle was good for 40 points to earn the second straight perfect team score for the Jumbos. For Jiang, Tinkjian, Lyle and
Sami Haynes, it was their third NCAA crown as members of the first varsity boat. Monroe and Barr became repeat winners.
Tufts became just the third program in NCAA Championships history to win three or more straight national championships, as Williams College won eight straight from 2006-13 and Bates College won four in a row from 2017 to 2021 including a missed year due to CoVID-19.
The back-to-back-back national championship win caps another tremendous year for Coach
Lily Siddall's Jumbos. They also won their third straight championships at the Head of the Charles Collegiate Eights, and took their fourth straight National Invitational Rowing Championships Points Trophy.
The title continued an incredible year for Tufts Athletics as a department, as the women's rowing team joined the Tufts field hockey, men's soccer and men's lacrosse teams as national champions in 2025-26.
--JUMBOS--
