Foiled In Boston, YU Fencers Look To Crush Next Opponents

The YU Fencing Team

The YU fencing squad began the month of February by traveling up to Boston to compete against the best fencing teams in the nation. With over 500 fencers in attendance, the tournament, held at Brandeis University, lasted for an exhausting 9 hours, fro m 8:30 am to 5:30 pm. Schools participating in the tournament included North Carolina, Duke, Notre Dame, Rutgers, MIT, Brown, Cornell, NYU and Boston College. The YU team vied against five of these teams.

In the end, Yeshiva did not come out with a victory, but the YU fencers did prove that they can fence with the nation’s best. In the process of fencing over 140 bouts, YU fencers scored over 1000 touches. Individual fencers also succeeded remarkably. Senior foil fencer Shaun Azari, hailing from Los Angeles, made the most of his last trip to Boston, returning with 6 wins. Epee fencers Hadar Weiss, a junior from Scranton, PA, freshman Alex Traiman from Marlboro, NJ, and sophomore Steve Mellner from S cranton, PA added four, three, and two wins respectively. The sabre squad, which is the strongest of the three weapons at Yeshiva, had a disappointing day, as they combined for only 7 wins.

The Sunday before travelling up to Boston, the YU fencing team journeyed up to Vassar College, in Poughkeepsie, NY, to fence Cornell, West Point, N.J.I.T (New Jersey Institute of Technology), and Stevens Tech. (Stevens and Hoboken Institute of Technolo gy).

The grueling schedule for the fencing squad continues over the next month, as the team spars with Lafayette and Haverford February 12, and Princeton University and Vassar College on February 22.

For a long time now, Yeshiva University has had a dominating fencing squad, making fencing one of Yeshiva's best sports. After competing against the top schools in the country, the fencing squad often returns to the teams in its own conference and sla ughters them. Even when the fencing team as a whole does not perform well, the nature of the sport allows for squads or individuals to advance beyond the team.

With an influx of freshman and sophomores on the team, Yeshiva has a wealth of unripe talent on this year's squad. However, due to the lack of experience, the conference record stands at 5-8. There are three weapons in fencing: sabre, epee, and foil. Only the sabre squad has hopes for glory at the fencing championships in March. However, foil fencer, Shaun Azari, and epee fencer, Hadar Weiss, each hope to succeed at the championships in March. In eppe, the freshman phenom Alex Traiman and sophomor e Steve Mellner have also been picking up steam of late, and look to perform well in the championships.

Despite the lack of experience on the team, Coach Messing came down hard on his team after the trip to Boston, blasting the experienced fencers for "not getting angry enough," and telling them that they must start fencing better now. Then he told the freshman and sophomores that he has seen many come on the team in their first year and fence much better than they. With an important stretch of the season still ahead, Coach Messing is hoping that his motivational speeches will move his fencers.