The Radcliffe women's varsity crew fell two boats short of glory on the placid waters of Lake Waramaug, Conn. Sunday.

Radcliffe placed a disappointing third at the Eastern Sprints, one-and-a-half seconds behind first-place Boston University and four-tenths of a second behind Princeton.

Coming into the race with a 4-2 record, Radcliffe had looked to the Sprints as a chance to take revenge for its pair of losses, suffered at the hands of the Terriers and the Tigers.

The Black-and-White, who practiced with B.U. over the last two weeks, were aware of the Terriers' strength, but had hoped to take Princeton.

"B.U. were the clear winners," coxswain Maye Chen said. "But Princeton was so close."

The women in black were looking for extra redemption in their competition against Princeton. The Tigers had beaten them out at Nationals last year, as well as earlier this year, so the split-second loss was particularly painful.

"This is definitely not the end of the season," Chen said. "We're all very psyched to take Princeton at Nationals."

"We feel all right about this weekend's race because we did what we wanted to do and we had a really good race," Chen added. "Our coach is changing around the lineup, so hopefully we'll pull out a little more speed."

The second varsity boat tripped on the oars of Northeastern, finishing nine-tenths of a second behind the victorious Huskies.

Northeastern's performance surprised the second boat. Radcliffe had beaten them easily at the beginning of the season, as well as earlier Sunday morning in the qualifying heat.

Lightweights

The lightweight four lost both its race and its undefeated season record. Radcliffe trailed the University of Rhode Island, who had given them their one close race of the season.