Williams won the first NCAA Division III Championship in 2002. The Ephs have won 10 NCAA titles overall including eight in a row from 2006 to 2013.

 

The first, best team in NCAA Div. III -- 2002 Williams Ephs

Women’s Crew started as a club team in the fall of 1971 when a number of first year women and a couple of exchange students came to the September men’s crew open invitation meeting to see if they could row and were told yes, there was boat available for them but they needed a coach.
 
Political Science professor George Marcus who had rowed at Columbia agreed to be the coach and he coached through the 1982-83 season.

Williams was a founding member of the Eastern Association of Women’s Rowing Colleges in 1974, and competed in the prestigious Sprints League for the first six years of its existence. The Ephs raced all of the Sprints League Teams, and defeated many of them over the years, among them, Radcliffe, Princeton, Dartmouth, Cornell, Syracuse. Only Yale and Wisconsin escaped  being defeated by the Ephs during those years. 
 
Women’s Crew was elevated to Varsity status for the 1987-88 season.
 
Janet Milne stroked the 1972-73 Ephs and that boat had three members who would row on U.S. National Teams: Dixie Rhodes, Nancy Storrs, and Anne Eisenmenger. In addition to those three - Susan Tuttle was on the U.S. National Team from 1977- 81. Tuttle  would have been in the 1980 Olympics but for the U.S. boycott. Tuttle and Nancy Storrs were on the U.S. team for 5 and 6 years respectively.
 
Carolyn Matthews was invited to join the U.S. National Team, but decided to go directly medical school instead of continuing her rowing career and Kris Karlson, who also went to medical school but continued her rowing later went on to win two world single (sculls) titles and one world double scull title.
 
Williams’ women rowers found great success on the international stage in the program’s first decade.  Nancy Storrs ’73 won a silver medal at the World Championships in 1975 as part of the “Red Rose Crew,” the first U.S. Women’s National Team camp boat, profiled by Daniel Boyne in his book of the same title. Anne Eisenmenger had also won a seat in that eight but a medical issue caused a last minute replacement
 
Storrs became Williams’ first female Olympian when she finished 6th in the Women’s 4+ in the 1976 Games in Montreal. Sue Tuttle '79 joined Storrs on the 1980 Olympic Team, though the United States’ boycott prevented them from competing. Tuttle would go on to win a bronze medal in the 4+ at the 1981 World Championships. Tuttle was the captain of the U.S. Women’s National Team during her senior year in 1977 and also captain at Williams. She was on every U.S. National Team from 1977-1981.
 
The early 1980’s brought hard times for the program, with three coaches in three years from 1982 to 1984.  In 1984, though, Christina “Cruzer” Cruz, a graduate of the University of Wisconsin and a former U.S. National Team coxswain, took over the program. Cruz would guide the team for 12 years, helping it to grow in size and achieve varsity status and regional prominence. Cruz guided the Ephs to the 1994 New England Championship and the Ephs won the title again in 1997 under head coach Robyn Horner.
  
Williams first appearance in the NCAA Championships came in 1998 when the Ephs qualified a four. Biz Smith, Sarah Thomas, Cynthia Osterling and Jana Comstack along with coxswain Yng-Ru Chen represented the Ephs and finished 5th.
 
With the arrival of head coach Justin Moore in the summer of 1999 the Eph program expanded its influence from being highly competitive in the region in NCAA DI in the early years to becoming a nationally competitive program in NCAA DIII.
 
In his first season Moore led the Ephs to the New England Championship and All Points Trophy, captured the Avaya Championship and landed an At-Large berth in the NCAA Rowing Championships for Women (all divisions). Moore repeated that effort in 2000 and 2001 and then in 2002 his Ephs won the first NCAA Division III Rowing Championships for Women when they topped the field in Indianapolis, Indiana. Moore's Ephs also claimed the 2006 NCAA title.

Williams became the first NCAA DIII team to win three NCAA Division III Championships in 2007, under the direction of interim head coach Pat Tynan, who was filling in for Moore who was on sabbatical that year with the Canadian National Teams.
The 2008 Ephs added to the rich history of Eph rowing by adding two more firsts -- first school to win three NCAA Division III titles in a row and the first school to win four titles overall in Division III.
Head coach Justin Moore was named the College Rowing Coaches Association Division III Coach of the Year and senior Louisa Berky and junior Allison Prevatt earned All-America honors.

In addition, six Ephs earned National Scholar All-American honors with Elissa Brown and Meg Conan being honored for the second year in a row, while Katherine Quayle, Sam Smith, Katherine Robinson and Kaitlin Kondel were honored for the first time.
Moore guided the Ephs to the NCAA title again in 2009 and 2010. In 2011 the Ephs were coached by interim Head Coach Brad Hemmerly who guided the Ephs to the 2011 NCAA championship.

Kate Maloney took over the Eph program in the summer of 2011 and she captured the NCAA title in both 2012 and 2013. Extending the Eph win streak to eight in a row.