MAD ABOUT YOU: Women’s Fencing on Fire...Again

So I know as soon as I start to talk about fencing the average reader will put down the paper saying, “fencing’s not a real sport” or “why would I care about fencing?”

Two years ago I’d say I was one of you. I didn’t know the difference between an epee and a foil or much less care for that matter. And then it happened.

In the spring of 2006 fencing put together all the ingredients necessary for a championship mix: a couple of international junior-circuit medalists, a dedicated team, and a coach just crazy enough to push his fencers to believe. I was hooked. A national championship team, one that can consistently compete with the best—how many of those do we have at Harvard?

Fast forward to this fall and the women failed to win the Ivy League last season, two-time Junior World Championship gold medalist Emily Cross is training for the Olympics, most of the rest of the winning team has graduated, and epee has gaping holes wide enough for all to see.

Preseason prediction: a mediocre rebuilding year for the young women’s squad. So what am I doing here and why are you still reading? Give me another few seconds of your time and I promise I’ll explain.

Last week, after eight days, 10 teams, and almost non-stop competition that included even the 2007 national champion—a challenge virtually no other athletic team at Harvard faces—the women sit a perfect 10-0 to end the fall season. This is all despite an epee squad that consists of a freshman walk-on, a former foil fencer, and just a single fencer trained in the weapon, despite a foil made up entirely of sophomores and despite a youthful sabre squad.

So why should you care? You try switching from center to point guard or picking up pitching at age 18 and then tell me that what these women have done isn’t impressive.

And if that isn’t enough to get you to climb to the third floor of the Malkin Athletic Center to see them, maybe it’ll be the intangibles that do. Maybe it’ll be what I’ll chalk up to a little bit of spunk mixed with a little bit of luck.

The Crimson’s got spunk galore. Displaying everything from tattoos to war wounds, the fencers boast a family-style relationship in which each is driven to perfection by the others.

And luck? If you can call it that, luck came into the picture in a hard-fought battle just two weekends ago. Facing off against a solid Penn State squad—a squad co-captain Samantha Parker said she can’t remember having defeated—the Nittany Lions’ coach made a questionable call.

With the score tied at 13 and the final foil bout on deck, a fencing enthusiast would expect to see the top foil fencer from each squad lining up. Instead, Harvard sophomore Misha Goldfeder found herself across from Penn State’s third best, who she defeated handily, 5-1, to rope in the 14-13 victory.

I know what you’re thinking. Yes, the Nittany Lions’ top foilist did win all three of her bouts, so it was a wash, right?

Well, it’s a little more complicated than that. The last bout, even when it’s not 13-13 is a psychological maker or breaker, and Penn State coach Emmanuil Kaidanov put his fencer in a position that gave her almost no shot at winning.

Numbers-wise the outcome would have been the same, but fencing is hardly a direct game of numbers. It’s just like in baseball: even if a team loses 4-2 and one run would seem to make no difference overall, a player being called out at home at some point could have changed the game’s entire complexion and made all the difference in the world.

So maybe Kaidanov’s offbeat choice made a difference, maybe it didn’t. Either way the Crimson defeated the Nittany Lions in a first to 14 game, despite losing 7-2 in epee.

To bring in the final tally we’ve got nailbiters, wins, spirit, luck, and spunk. And did I mention wins?

With nearly two months off before the next competition and the all-important Ivy League and national matchups there isn’t much to follow now. But come February maybe knowing the full picture we’ll all think more seriously about making the trek to the MAC.

—Staff writer Madeleine I. Shapiro can be reached at mshapiro@fas.harvard.edu.