Fencing teams troubled by results at NCAAs

To the every-day, average Penn fencing groupie, it may seem the Quakers did an excellent job in their overall performances in South Bend, Ind., at the NCAA fencing tournament. Penn came in seventh place out of a field of about 30 schools nationally. Penn had seven of nine fencers finish in the top 20 of their individual weapon classes. Penn had one second-team all-American and one honorable mention all-American. Penn had a slew of fencers achieve all-Ivy status. Despite all of these achievements, however, both men and women Penn fencers wanted more -- and felt they deserved it. "We were hoping for the top six," Penn coach Dave Micahnik said. "It certainly wasn't bad, but we aspire to better than that. It wasn't a sign of what our program ought to be." Junior sabrer George Kalmar had the best showing of all the Penn fencers, finishing fifth overall, and gaining second-team all-American status. It was the first time in his collegiate career, though, that Kalmar had to settle for less than first-team all-American. Along with that drop, Kalmar also dropped from a third-place national ranking last year, to fifth this year. The Quakers' other all-American representative was women's foil Megumi Sakae. After posting a 14-9 round robin record, she finished ninth overall to get honorable mention. On the flip side of women's foil was senior Christina Kim, fencing in her first and last NCAA competition. She failed to make it past the preliminary round to the 24-fencer round robin. "I was pretty disappointed. I got off to a slow start," Kim said. "I was hoping to at least make it to the round robin." She finished 25th overall, missing the cut by one touch. Penn's top men's epee fencer, Alex Edelman also failed to perform up to his capabilities. He dropped 13 bouts in the round robin, leading to an overall ranking of 16. "I'm disappointed in myself for not performing up to my own standards," Edelman said. "Everyone there earned their place in the tournament, but I blame myself." In addition, Edelman, along with the other fencers, heavily criticized the format of the competition, which had changed from last year. "A five-touch bout is so short, anything can happen. If you lose your concentration, and not focus on that one touch you're trying to win, you can blow your leads," Edelman said. Kalmar agreed. "Its ridiculous. On a five-touch bout my dog can beat me on a good day," he said. "Along with terrible officiating and no rankings, this year's tournament just had a really poor format." Another factor in the tournament was intimidation, especially for the freshmen fencers competing for the first time. Freshman Anastasia Gunzberg, who received first-team all-Ivy honors, was clearly intimidated just by the sheer number of people there. Gunzberg had a decent first round, going 4-2 to enter the round robin, but slipped to 11-12 in that competition for a 14th-place overall finish. "I'm not happy because I wanted to be in the top eight. I made some dumb mistakes which led to some losses against some very good fencers," she said. Freshman sabrer Sanjiv Agashiwala also faltered somewhat in the round robin, finishing 9-14 for a 17th-place finish. Rounding out Penn's men's representatives were foil fencers Adam Brown and Nathan Anderson. Both made it into the round of 24, but both also emerged with losing records. Brown (8-15) finished 18th overall, and was slightly edged out by Anderson (11-12) who came out with a 14th-place ranking. The only other fencer not to make the round of 24 was women's freshman epee Olivia Leon, who ended up 32nd overall. Despite her finish, however, she will be returning next year to help form the heart of the women's epee squad. The men's 1994-95 fencing season also officially closed, with members of the squad feeling slightly disappointed with the season. "The season was full of opportunity and we just missed," Edelman said. "We had some very close matches, where we jumped out ahead and had to scramble to pull it out." "We didn't do that well in the Ivies," Kalmar added. "Personally, I'm thrilled -- I had the best record in the Ivy League." On the women's side of the strip, the team pulled off another Ivy League championship and should return all but one of its starting fencers. "Our only graduate is Christine [Kim], and she was a vital part of the foil team's success, but I'm optimistic about the future," Micahnik said.