"Northeastern was clearly the class of the collegiate teams," Craw said. "I don't think we could have possibly beaten them today. They put together a great race and we're going to have to work really hard to beat them in the spring."

Harvard was the class of the Ivy field, however, defeating sixth-place Brown by nine seconds, and downing Yale by more than 20 seconds. Eli's men turned in a disappointing 12th-place finish.

Heading into the race, Brown and Princeton were expected to give the U.S. and German National teams a run for their money, while Yale was hoping for a top-five performance.

Brown finished only nine seconds behind the German National team a year ago, but Harvard's performance yesterday was a pleasant surprise.

Immediately following the men's race, the Radcliffe heavyweight crew rowed to a surprising fourth-place finish in the Championship Eight division, only to drop to 15th after being assessed a 20-second penalty.

A strong cross-wind and confusion at the starting line pushed the Radcliffe crew left of the first two buoys, resulting in a pair of 10-second penalties that cost the team 11 spots in the rankings.

"The wind was really pushing the boat left, and to make matters worse, the officials had us line up on the far left-hand side of the course," women's heavyweight captain Stephanie Malliaris said. "The buoys just went under the starboard instead of the port oars and once we missed the first buoy, there wasn't enough time to adjust before we missed the second."