After opening the Ivy League season with mixed results at Yale on Saturday, the Penn men's and women's fencing teams finished a busy weekend on Sunday by sweeping their first home meet against both Rutgers and Johns Hopkins.
On Saturday, the men's team beat Yale by a score of 17-10, while the women's team fell to the Elis 15-12.
Helped by sophomore Jon Gale's going 3-0 in the epee, the men topped Yale in all three weapons, en route to an overall victory.
The women had to face three very good fencers from Yale in each weapon, and couldn't exploit the weaker fencers enough to pull out a win.
The Elis "were better than I had expected on the women's side," coach Dave Micahnik said. "They have three number ones [on each weapon], but I thought that our balance was better. We needed one of the sabre bouts. When you lose 15-12 it's a two-bout swing."
The teams came home on Sunday to go a combined 4-0 against Rutgers and Hopkins.
The men edged Rutgers in their first match by a single point, 14-13. The team went down early, by a 7-2 score in the sabre, but a nearly perfect 8-1 performance in the foil helped the Quakers squeak out a victory.
Micahnik was happy with the win but realized that the team is still in need of someimprovement.
"I saw some mental lapses," Micahnik said. "In some cases [Rutgers] had better fencers, but there are some bouts they should have won that they missed."
The men finished the day strong by blowing away the Blue Jays by a score of 23-4.
After losing a tough Ivy League match against Yale, the women rebounded by breezing through Sunday's home meet, crushing Rutgers, 24-3, and Hopkins, 22-5.
Micahnik, still getting over the women's loss to Yale, wasn't overly happy following the victories.
"It's hard to fault the women's team for basically blowing them out, but there are always things here and there they could have done better."
Having lost to Yale a day earlier, the defending Ivy League champs were playing with a chip on their shoulders.
"I think there is a certain level of vindication," Micahnik said. "I think they fought harder than they might otherwise have, but I can't imagine they wouldn't fight hard anyway. I think each one of them had to validate her level."
Sunday was a successful day for both teams; many players on each side put up strongperformances.
On the men's side, Michael Galligan came through in the clutch, winning the final and clinching bout against Rutgers and finishing the day 6-0.
For the women, almost everyone bounced back and fenced well on Sunday. Christina Kaneshige, Holly Buechel and Jackie Schramm went undefeated at 6-0. Annika Eiremo, Casey Frey and Lauren Phillips went undefeated as well, winning 5-0, 4-0 and 4-0, respectively.
