This weekend figures to be an excellent opportunity for the women's crew team. Penn travels to Rutgers tomorrow morning to take on the Scarlet Knights and Cornell for the Class of '89 plate. The Quakers are ranked eighth in th 18-team Eastern Association of Women's Rowing Colleges. Cornell and Rutgers are ranked fourth and seventh, providing an excellent opportunity for Penn to improve on its divisional ranking. Based on their head races in the fall, the Quakers originally were picked in the bottom of their league, which is arguably the toughest in the country. However, wins over Syracuse and Northeastern last weekend in the Orange Challenge Cup has put them in the thick of the race. If Penn wants to move up even further, it will have to do so against a very fast Cornell crew. The Big Red beat the Red and Blue by 10 seconds earlier this season in the San Diego Classic. "Cornell is looking really good this year," Penn coach Carol Bower said. "If we can beat them, then we are doing exceptionally well. I don't want to say that we can't do that, but that's going to be a big challenge for us." Rutgers is a crew that looked very good in head races this past fall, but the Scarlet Knights are just about at the Quakers' level. "If we can knock off Rutgers, that will move us up," Bower said. "And if we can come close or beat Cornell, that will help us as well." Since the Red and Blue will be more challenged tomorrow than they were last week, the race will take on a different look. Instead of breaking away from the competition, Penn will most likely race Rutgers and Cornell side by side. "We're going to have to keep our focus," Bower said. "It's a matter of disciplining ourselves to do the same things we've been doing -- this time when the boats are side by side." The race will be held on Rutgers' Raritan River. Only Penn's seniors have raced there before, and the Quakers will not be able to go over the course beforehand. This means the rowers will have to imagine their own home marks and think about the race more inwardly. "Everyone is really excited about this race," co-captain Alison Goldstein said. "If we race in control and confidently, and we all race together, we'll do well."
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