Fencing squads sweep opener

Going into Saturday's action against Duke, Haverford and Brown, the Penn women's fencing team was expecting to be without its No. 1 fencer, Megumi Sakae, who was ill. With Sakae, who was voted the top female fencer in the Ivy League last year, sitting on the sidelines, the rest of the Quakers squad stepped up and, aside from a tough battle against the Duke, won its half of the meet comfortably. The women fought off the Blue Devils, 19-13, and crushed Brown and Haverford, 24-8 and 29-3, respectively. "The competition was good enough to make us fence, but it was not good enough to defeat us," Quakers coach Dave Micahnik said. The men's team also opened the regular season with a clean sweep of Duke, Haverford and Brown, easily defeating the Blue Devils, 21-6, on the strength of a 9-0 shutout of Duke's sabre squad -- a squad which had to fill in with one member of the Duke women's team. "The Duke coach told me that his sabre team was a little weak," said Micahnik. "And I guess he was right." The Quakers also carved up the Bears and Fords by scores of 17-10 and 20-7. The Penn women got off to a slow start against Duke. The Blue Devils jumped out to a 3-1 lead, but when Penn sophomore Cindy Kwan ousted her opponent in the second round of foil competition, she knotted the overall score at 3. "Kwan's victory in the second round was the real turning point in the Duke bout," Micahnik said. But not comfortable with his team's lead, Penn coach Dave Micahnik called on Sakae to compete in the final two rounds of foil competition. Not taking any chances, Micahnik inserted Megumi Sakae in the final two rounds of foil competition and, despite not feeling well, Sakae made quick work of her opponents. "It's always nice to have the No. 1 fencer on call if need be," Micahnik said. At the end of foil competition, the score was tied at eight. The women's epee team then took control of the contest, winning its matches by a combined score of 11-5 The men's team began the meet a bit overconfident in its bouts with heavy underdog Brown, before eventually settling down. "We were a little too laid back against Brown," said sophomore sabre fencer Sandy Agashiwala. "We beat them really bad last year, and we noticed that they had many of the same fencers, but we found at soon enough that it was not going to be a breeze this year." The men's sabre team narrowly won their portion of the competition, 5-4. But this was apparently the wake-up call the Quakers needed as they were able to cruise the rest of the way, to a healthy -- albeit closer-than-expected -- victory.