The New York University men's and women's fencing teams hosted their first-ever meet at the John A. Paulson Center on Wednesday, February 14, in Manhattan.
The Violets faced Columbia University, Vassar College and Sacred Heart University in the George Kolombatovich Historical Meet, with both the men and the women winning two of their three matches.
In the first competition of the night, NYU took on Columbia, the NCAA's top-ranked team. The
#9-ranked NYU men's team fell to the Lions 15-12, while the
26th-ranked women's team fell to Columbia by a score of 16-11.
The men's saber team was victorious in the match, 7-2, while the women's foil team won by the same score.
Kevin Zu won all three of his saber bouts, while
Aurora Aschettino was a perfect 3-0 in foil.
The Violets next faced Vassar (#28 men, #34 women), and both NYU teams were victorious. The women won 18-9, taking both foil (8-1) and saber (6-3), while just being edged in epee (5-4).
Polly Adler and
Annika Santos both went 3-0 in foil. The men's victory came by a score of 16-11, as both saber (7-2) and epee (5-4) were winners, and foil was edged 5-4.
Will Margulies was 3-0 in saber and
Ian Adler won both of his epee bouts.
NYU ended its evening with a pair of wins against Sacred Heart (#21 men, #32 women). The women swept all three weapons in a dominating 22-5 victory. Adler won another three foil bouts, while
Lily Papadakis went an unblemished 3-0 in epee. The men battled the Pioneers to the end before pulling out a 14-13 victory by ekeing out saber and epee victories by identical 5-4 scores.
Oliver Hu picked up two foil wins while
Tyler Cho took two epee bouts.
Prior to the start of Wednesday's meet, the Violets celebrated Senior Day as 11 Violets were honored:
Polly Adler,
Leanne Chan,
Michael Kang,
Ethan Kim,
Andrew Sledeski,
Maria Stamos,
Brendan Tang,
Nicholas Topaz,
Ashley van den Bol,
Ryan Xu, and
Kevin Zu.
Both teams return to the strip for the Long Island University Shark Showdown on Sunday, February 25, in Brooklyn, NY.
