On Feb. 26, Brandeis hosted New England’s Intercollegiate Fencing Conference and placed significantly in both the individual and team aspects. The Brandeis women placed forth, and men sixth making the Judges fourth overall. 

Maggie Shealy ’23 played a significant role in the team’s win, going 14-0 in the team competition leaving the saber squad close behind MIT and Tufts in third place. Shealy described the experience, “This was my first season as being named a women’s captain, and I was pretty nervous. To have the title of captain is very important and you hold a lot of influence on your teammates, especially the newer ones to the team. I’ve been very grateful and happy to make friendships and connections with my team and to see them earn victories. And as a squad captain group as a whole, I am certainly proud of how far we as captains have developed and grown throughout the year, so I’m super excited to be working with some of the same teammates next year, and also happy for those who are graduating, and will miss them dearly.”

During her own competition, Shealy won 4-1 during the pool play and won the elimination bout 15-4, 15-12 and 15-11. She explained how, “Going into the match, I knew that Casey (my opponent) was an incredibly talented and smart fencer, and I too had to fence smart. There were a lot of instances in the finals match where she was able to read me really well and could counter me … I think the factor that pushed me to be able to beat her was being able to pick up on her patterns and to disrupt them once she got too comfortable. And overall it was a really strong match, I have a lot of respect for her as an opponent and person, she pushes me to fence the best that I can.”

For the women’s team, Brandeis’s most significant win was that of the epee squad tying with Brown and Vassar for first and the foil squad they finished sixth. The strong sense of community at Brandeis flows out into all of its sports as Shealy explained, “The biggest thing that contributed to my win was the support from my teammates. Teammates who either were knocked out early or had a different job for the day followed me around as I began the individual round cheering me on or coaching me, which I really appreciated. I’m very glad that they were there for me, because their support and teammateship means everything to me.” Additionally, within this team competition with 12 wins Angela Shi ’24 placed second in her pool and Calla Lee ’25 fifth with 11 wins, which helped to move the team forward. 

For the men’s sabre (24 wins) an epee (19 wins) squad they finished fourth, with foil (21 wins) in sixth. Within the sabre squad freshman Joy Qui pushed the team competition forward with a score of 10-1, as well as senior Lucas Lin with 7-4 allowing them to make the individual rounds where Qui had one win. In terms of the men’s foil sophomore Chaemin Daniel Lee and junior Drew Miller won 7-4 in the team competition, leading Lee into the individuals.

The Judges are set for many more things as they are heading to NCAA regionals soon. Shealy exclaimed, “I look forward to continuing to train with my teammates for regionals at Vassar. It’s been a really long season, and we certainly aren’t the same fencers we walked in as, and our growth has been tremendous. My teammates push me to be the best person, fencer, and coach that I can be, and I really love being around them, whether that be in the weightroom, the fencing room or the classroom.”