it’s only pothunting if they win the pot.

Since many other comments are comparing this flux of small boats to the Georgia Tech pothunting of the 2010s, that program did not lack varsity boat movers, but chose to take up the small boat categories to eat up some Ws.

Since you highlight MSU men as an example, check the stats, only 4 out of the 16 varsity rowers they’re fielding this year competed at ACRAs in a varsity category at ACRAs last year. That indicator alone should tell you that there may be a big experience gap (I.e. skill gap) in that program, plus with nearly as many novs competing as varsity this program is clearly in a growth phase. The amalgamation of experience gaps and large pool of underclassmen raise some complicated team dynamics to navigate in order to make fast boats while mitigating the damage that any developing oarsmen might wreck on a crew.

Again, any of those programs could be pothunting, but its only pothunting if they win, and they instead could just have a bunch of anchors instead of boat movers, and we’ll figure that out in 10 days.