This post was written by Hatchet reporter Rob Bartnichak.

Women’s rowing finished fourth out of nine teams Sunday in the Atlantic 10 Championship, earning two medals from races on the Occoquan River.

The Varsity 8 finished fourth in the finals with a time of 7:34.89, while the Junior Varsity 8 came in fifth. The Varsity 4 boat brought home a bronze medal with a time of 8:48.12.

“It was some tough racing but some good racing,” head coach Eric Carcich said at the tournament in Woodbridge, Va.

The Varsity 8 beat Saint Joseph’s in the morning’s qualifying race, but the Hawks pushed them off the podium in the grand final with a third-place finish by just over a second. Rhode Island, the only team who bested its own qualifying time in the finals, likely benefitted from a slow heat and came in second to UMass, which won with a time of 7:26.00 and received a bid to compete in the NCAA championship races.

GW’s performance stood in stark contrast to last year’s A-10 Championship, where weaknesses in the lower boats pushed the Colonials into third overall even with a dominant gold-medal win in the Varsity 8 race.

Though it didn’t factor into the final standings, the third Varsity 8 had the day’s best finish, coming in second to Rhode Island.

At the event’s awards ceremony, senior Bethany Grim was named First Team All-Conference and seniors Megan Culberson and Sarah Pickus earned Second Team All-Conference honors.

Carcich said he plans to tap into the team’s talent as a unit and continue to improve the rowers until they win their first conference title. The Colonials peaked in 2012 with a second-place finish in the tournament, but have trended downward ever since.

“I’m really excited about the depth we’re showing,” Carcich said. “We’re going to work hard all summer to get faster.”