UNC crew, fencing teams seek student walk-ons

An interest meeting today might put students one step closer to becoming varsity athletes.

That’s where North Carolina senior Brittany Walsh found herself three years ago as a freshman. Walsh attended an interest meeting for women’s crew, or rowing, one of the two sports holding open tryouts today for the school.

“I was one of the girls that came on campus freshman year, actually went to an interest meeting and fell in love,” Walsh said.
Sophomore and former UNC varsity fencer Seth Crabtree remembers a similar story when he was a freshman.

“I walked on,” Crabtree said. “I had never (fenced) before. I was a basketball player in high school.”

Crabtree and Walsh are two prime examples of why fencing coach Ron Miller and rowing coach Sarah Haney hold interest meetings and open tryouts.

The fencing team will hold an interest meeting today at 5 p.m. in Fetzer Gym, Room 07. Similarly, the rowing team will hold its own interest meeting in the Eddie Smith Field House at 7 p.m.

Unlike mainstream sports like football and basketball, both rowing and fencing cannot fill their entire rosters with scholarships. The two sports are the only varsity programs at UNC that recruit students with no prior experience in the sport, but that doesn’t mean the teams aren’t full of athletes.

“The rowing team here at UNC is very, very close-knit,” Haney said. “It’s a bunch of great, great athletes that either don’t know they’re athletes yet or don’t know that they are rowers yet.”

Haney said the rowing team relies “pretty heavily” on recruiting walk-ons from interest meetings. Eighty-five percent of the fencing roster is composed of walk-ons, Miller said.

Almost every rowing walk-on spends the first year on the novice squad, with the exception of a rare rower who can prove herself early.

Last year, UNC finished seventh in the Directors’ Cup, which measures both men’s and women’s varsity sports’ postseason success among all Division I schools.

“There are so few people that go to and represent the University from an athletic standpoint,” Haney said. “The fact that we can still offer that opportunity in another sport, I think that’s really pretty cool.”

The title “varsity athlete” brings other perks, as well.

All varsity athletes have academic support from tutors provided by the University, a separate lottery for other UNC sporting events — including men’s basketball games — and access to Nike gear.

“If they catch us wearing anything other than Nike gear while we practice, then we’re in some trouble,” Crabtree said.
The two programs offer a unique opportunity for students to compete as varsity athletes at UNC and benefit from all that can entail.

“We have to have quality athletes,” Miller said.

“If you take someone from zero to a starting role one year… we can make them not just a Carolina athlete, but a quality Carolina athlete.”

Contact the Sports Editor at sports@unc.edu.