Despite high expectations, the Hopkins women's fencing team placed seventh at the National Intercollegiate Women's Fencing Association Championship. A total of 17 teams competed in the NIWFA Championship on Feb. 25 and 26.
The team hoped to place as high as second in order to win the Army Trophy. "Temple is the dominant team in this tournament," head coach Jim Murray said. "The meet is really run for the second place trophy." For the past several years, Temple has consistently placed first place at the championship.
Despite receiving seventh place, the team did better than their score reflects. "We actually lost to only four other teams," Murray said. "But the scoring uses a sliding scale, which placed us seventh."
The match was so close in scoring, that one touch could have placed Hopkins as high as fourth place. With such a close match, even small losses greatly impacted the team's total rank. In the individual event placing, the Jays placed fifth for foil, sixth for 8ep8ee and eighth for saber.
Individual fencers also competed strongly, with four Jays placing in the top 15 for their individual championships. Freshman Grace Fried finished sixth overall in the individual foil championships. In 8ep8ee, senior Catherine Gallagher and sophomore Cindy Liu placed tenth and 13th, respectively. Finishing 12th overall in the saber was freshman Erica Hartmann. One team member, junior Joanna Kochaniak, was also named to the All-American Academic team.
As for the future, the Jays qualified five fencers for the NCAA regional fencing meet. In saber, both Hartmann and junior Sarah Smilow qualified. Gallagher and Liu are competing in 8ep8ee, and senior Liz Ordun and Fried will be representing Hopkins in foil.
The top players from the NCAA regional meet go onto the NCAA National Championships.
"The Mid-Atlantic region, consisting of the area from New Jersey to North Carolina, is the most difficult region to compete in," Murray said. "Due to such a strong show of force, it's always the hardest to place into nationals from."
Other teams that will be represented at the regionals are Penn State, Duke, University of North Carolina, University of Pennsylvania and Rutgers. The meet will take place at Duke.
In the past, Hopkins has sent fencers to the NCAA National championships, but not for many years. Last year, sophomore Annie Holstein was the first alternate. If one of the competing fencers were forced to withdraw, Holstein would have been the first to take their place.
The men's fencing team placed second at the Mid-Atlantic Collegiate Fencing Association meet at the New Jersey Institute of Technology. One of Hopkins' biggest rivals, Drew, scored a close win of 15-12, in order to beat the Jays. Drew beat Hopkins earlier in the season in a close game at the NJIT meet.
Despite the loss against Drew, Hopkins went on to beat Yeshiva, NJIT, Stevens and Hunter College. While the team placed second overall, the Jays actually placed first in foil, second in 8ep8ee, and third in saber. Hopkins also had several players place in the individual championships. Four fencers placed in the top five for the individual championships.
In 8ep8ee, freshman Daniel Zielinski placed second. For foil, both junior Nick Marchuk and freshman David Ferguson placed second and fourth, respectively. In the team event, Marchuk was unbeaten. For saber, freshman Alex Bachman also was undefeated and placed third in the individuals.
Last year, Hopkins finished first at the MACFA championships, competing against fourteen other teams. Overall, the team's record is 26-14.
The men's team also has the NCAA regional and national championships in the upcoming weeks.
As for the rest of the men's and women's teams, regionals are only for individual players. That means that NIWFA and MACFA were the last team meets for the year -- and the last ever for the graduating members of the team.
"We will miss our seniors," Murray said.
