Fencing dominates Ivies Engineers bout Brown, Yale, Cornell at invite
The MIT men’s and women’s fencing teams competed at the Brandeis Invitational last weekend. The women went 4-1, and now have nine match wins on the season, while the men went 1-4 to get their fourth match win.
The women’s team got strong performances from its sabre and epee teams, scoring victories over Brown, Cornell, Haverford, and Yale, and dropping their only match to a very strong St. John’s University.
In the first round, the Engineers began their sweep of the Ivy League teams with a 15-12 victory over Brown University. They were unable to handle the St. John’s Red Storm, falling 19-8 to St. John’s, but bounced back to defeat Cornell by a slim 14-13 margin. MIT went on to handle Haverford and Yale to finish the meet with a 4-1 record.
The Engineers performed best in sabre, where they had a final record of 34-11. Molly A. Kozminsky ’12 swept her opponents in the four victories for MIT en route to going 13-2 at the meet. Robin S. Shin ’12 equaled her mark, while Annabeth Gellman ’13 and Elena A. Tatarchenko ’11 added seven victories between them.
The epee team earned 7-2 match victories over Haverford and Yale, while competing to a 26-19 mark over the competition. Kirsten S. Hessler ’12 and senior Kristin D. Kuhn ’11 each posted 10-5 records for Tech and Sophie M. Monahan ’11 won four of her eight bouts.
Jenna G. Caldwell ’11 led the Engineers foil squad with seven bout victories, two each against Haverford and Cornell. Julia A. Hopkins ’12 won four bouts and Julia G. Kimmerly ’13 added one.
The men’s team, despite some struggles, left the Invitational with one win in four matches, beating Haverford in the fifth round of competition. Jackson T. Crane ’13 and Joseph F. Rafidi ’14 led the way for the epee team, who had 18 bout victories over the weekend.
The Engineers began the competition falling at the hands of Brown University by a 17-10 score and then losing to St. John’s 18-9. After a few rounds off, however, they were able to get by Haverford 16-11 for their first victory of the meet. MIT closed their weekend with a 20-7 defeat to the Yale Bulldogs.
The Epee fencers for MIT went 18-18 through the meet, led by impressive performances by Crane and Rafidi. Each fencer emerged from the weekend with a 9-3 record, with Rafidi sweeping all three bouts against Haverford and Crane going 3-0 against Brown and Yale. The epee team won three of their matches, all by scores of 5-4, falling only to St. John’s by a 6-3 margin.
Foil picked up 15 bouts over the weekend, thanks to Benjamin N. Nield ’12 and Daniel S. Levine ’12. Nield won six bouts, including a sweep of his St. John’s opponents, while Levine added six of his own. Richard C. LaGrandier ’11 won three bouts as well.
The sabre team was key to MIT’s victory over Haverford, winning six of nine points. Maximilian L. Brand ’11, Vinayak Ramesh ’12, and Isaac P. Businger ’11 each won two bouts in the Haverford match, with Brand leading the way for sabre overall with four bouts won.
The Engineers fencers now have a month and a half break, as they will wait until after the holiday break before taking to the strips again. Tech next competes on January 22 at Brown University, who will host the second Northeast Fencing Conference meet of the year.