If the first weekend of Ivy League competition proved anything, it showed that the young Penn fencers -- both men and women -- are on the verge of taking the league by storm.
Just not quite yet.
Without much depth or experience, the teams turned in respectable performances on Sunday in Ithaca, N.Y., in the first of two meets that will determine the Ancient Eight champion.
The women excelled, beating Yale and Princeton. Their sole loss came at the hands of Columbia, who beat the Quakers in only one weapon.
Led by the epee team, the Penn women notched a resounding 21-6 win over Yale.
The epee won eight of nine bouts, while freshman Cassandra Partyka and junior captain Katelyn Sherry dominated the sabre.
Sherry, coming off of a broken foot suffered before the season, went 3-0 against the Bulldogs.
Against Princeton, a 9-0 win in the sabre carried the day for Penn, which lost in both the foil and the epee. Princeton edged out Penn in the foil 5-4 and in the epee 6-3, but the end result was a 16-11 win for the Red and Blue.
The Quakers' loss to Columbia was the opposite of their win over Yale.
While Penn's foil and epee both etched out 5-4 victories, the sabre fell to the Lions 7-2, as Columbia beat Penn 15-12 overall.
"We learned all too well from today that you can't get blown out in one weapon and hope to pull it out," Penn coach Dave Micahnik said.
There were still positives to take from the loss, including freshman Kristen Hughes' and junior Holly Buechel's impressive wins over first team all-American epeeist Morgan Midgley.
The men only managed to defeat one of the three teams they faced, but they narrowly missed going undefeated for the day.
Like the women, the men had no trouble with Yale, winning 19-8.
Led by the talented trio of sophomore Ron Berkowsky, junior Mike Galligan, and sophomore Corey Purcell, the foil cruised to an 8-1 victory, while the sabre won 5-4 and the epee won 6-3.
Purcell, who along with Berkowsky went 3-0 against Yale, continued to impress his coaches and teammates alike. They say he has made a rapid adjustment to fencing full-time at the next level.
"He's really coming on strong," Micahnik said.
The Quakers dropped a heartbreaker to Princeton, winning in both the sabre (5-4) and the foil (7-2) but losing in the epee (8-1).
Micahnik said a bad call by the official in freshman Matthew Kolasa's sabre bout turned out to be devastating, as Kolasa lost 5-4. Princeton grabbed the extra point and prevailed, 14-13.
Aside from a strong showing in the foil, Penn struggled against Columbia, falling 16-11.
In the foil, Berkowky's winning streak came to an end when he lost his first bout of the season to junior Scott Sugimoto. Nonetheless, the Quakers took six out of nine foil bouts, as the sabre and epee teams lost 7-2 and 6-3, respectively.
Next week, both teams travel to New York for the final weekend of Ivy League competition.
In order for either team to have any shot at winning the league, it will have to beat powerhouse Harvard, which is extremely talented across the board.
Penn will also face Brown and Cornell, two teams that, according to Micahnik, cannot be overlooked.
But as the teams begin to hit full stride, Micahnik feels that they will only get better.
"Right now we have no seniors," he said. "We're going to be the best that we can be now, and we'll be even better next year."
