2008 Woodie Awards
Eleven Johnnies qualify for NCAA's
St. John's fencing fares well in NCAA Regionals
Matt Choquette, Staff Writer
Issue date: 3/5/08 Section: Sports
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The event was the NCAA Fencing Northeast Regional Qualifiers, the seeding event leading up to the big show: the NCAA Championships. The fencers are seeded according to the combination of their prior ranking and their results in
the qualifier.
"We should qualify 11 people when this is over," said head coach Yuri Gelman. "That is our goal. This competition is a qualifier for the finals, so that is what we'll do."
Right before the lunch recess, St. John's had four fencers ranked first in their respective categories. This did not surprise Gelman.
"There have been no surprises so far. This is what I expect of my team. We're ready for anything," he said before reassuring with a smile, "Everything is fine."
Gelman's prediction was accurate. Eleven St. John's fencers qualified for the NCAA Championships after all the pools were completed. In the men's sabre, senior Luther Clement took gold while freshman Charles Worsham finished third. Worsham made an impressive comeback from ninth place, where he was ranked midday, and commented on fencing with Clement in the
same event.
"Luther is a great guy to coach you on the strip, and great to learn from,"
he said.
Torian Brown also qualified in the sabre with an at-large bid.
Misha Mokretsov and Stan Vaksman both qualified in the men's epee, finishing fourth and fifth, respectively.
Meanwhile, in the men's foil, Henry Kennard finished sixth and Brendan Meyers left with ninth place. Both qualified for the NCAA's as foil teammate Alexis Landreville missed the cut with his eleventh place finish.
Despite being ranked first and second at the halfway point, Kennard and Meyers denied the existence of a
friendly rivalry.
"I just want to qualify, and I always want to win," said Kennard. "But I'm always pulling for [Meyers]."
Meyers admitted that his performance thus far was "so far, so good", considering there was a lot of fencing to be done. He believes strong preparation is the key to success in these events.
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