.png)
Three Orange Student-Athletes Win Undergraduate Case Study in Whitman School
3/11/2026 12:29:00 PM | Men's Rowing
Three members of the Syracuse men's rowing program took home first place in the second annual Whitman Real Estate Case Competition, held Feb. 27 at the Martin J. Whitman School of Management.
Seniors Benjamin Campbell-Reide, Ethan Graham and Samuel Fernandez, competing under the team name Coxed Pair Development, earned the top prize of $7,500 after presenting a mixed-income adaptive reuse proposal for a vacant seven-story historic office building in downtown Syracuse's Hanover Square. Their winning concept called for 36 residential units and three commercial spaces — including a golf simulator lounge, a premium restaurant and a fitness studio — while utilizing a layered capital structure that combined Federal and State Historic Tax Credits with Low-Income Housing Tax Credit equity to deliver seven affordable units.
The competition, presented by the Kuhn Real Estate Center with support from CoreOne Industrial, drew 12 cross-disciplinary undergraduate teams challenged to determine the highest and best use for the historic property, weighing market demand, financial feasibility, zoning, sustainability and community impact. The top five finalists were each paired with an industry mentor from the Whitman alumni network to guide their preparation before presenting to a panel of distinguished real estate professionals.
Campbell-Reide is a real estate finance major in the Whitman School and Fernandez studies advertising in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. A total of $20,000 in cash prizes was distributed among the five finalist teams.
The trio's victory marks the second consecutive year that members of the Syracuse rowing program have reached the finals of the competition. Last year, Joseph Biondolillo '25, Campbell-Reide, Fernandez, Timofey Sitnik '28 and Nikki Strauss '28 earned second place in the inaugural competition as Regatta Realty.
Syracuse opens its racing season on April 11 at the Princeton Invitational in Princeton, N.J. The Orange enter the year ranked No. 9 by Junior Rowing News and have placed in the Grand Final of the Intercollegiate Rowing Association (IRA) Championship in each of the last five seasons — one of just two programs in the country to do so.
For more on Syracuse men's rowing, follow @CuseMRowing on social media.
Players Mentioned
