Brandeis men’s and women’s fencing competed in their first tournament of the year on Saturday, Nov. 5. The New England Fall Intercollegiate Championship (NEFIC) took place at Smith College in Northampton, MA.
Brandeis fencers entered the day with a pre-tournament ranking, determined by last year’s NEFIC results and each player’s rank. Notably, Guillermo Narvaez ’18 earned the first seed in the pre-tournament rankings for men’s foil and Kyle Berney ’18 earned the second seed for the men’s saber tournament. Nina Sayles ’17 also earned a solid pre-tournament ranking, seeded third for women’s saber.
The best showing of the day from the Brandeis team was Sayles, taking second place overall in her event. She began by sweeping the seven-person pool she was assigned. Advancing to the tournament event, Sayles moved up to the second seed.
She advanced through the tournament, defeating fencers from Vassar, MIT, Boston University and Boston College, ultimately falling to Kaleigh Mentzer from Dartmouth College in the finals.
Rookie Jessica Gets ’20 also had a long run in the tournament, placing fifth in women’s foil. She dominated her six-person pool, taking five touches against all her pool-opponents, while only receiving two.
Starting the pool at the 10th seed, Gets moved up to the seventh seed after sweeping her pool. In tournament play, she defeated two opponents from Dartmouth and one from Sacred Heart before MIT’s Jessica Li ended her tournament run.
For the men, Len Grazian ’17 had a distinguished showing in the men’s foil event, tying for third with a Boston College fencer. Grazian swept his six-person pool, shifting his seventh seed placement before the pool round to the second seed before tournament play.
Grazian made a push to the semifinals by defeating a Boston University fencer, two Sacred Heart fencers, as well as Brandeis teammate Narvaez in the quarterfinals. Brown fencer Umar Masood knocked Grazian out of the tournament.
Ian Quin ’20, Elishua Litle ’18 and Narvaez placed sixth, seventh and eighth, respectively, in the men’s foil event.
The team is optimistic about the future, according to Gets. “I feel like we are going to do really well; we have a really strong incoming freshman team that will really help with our wins.”
The team will fence again at the first Northeast Fencing Conference Meet at MIT on Saturday, Nov. 19. Other teams at the meet will include University of Massachusetts in Boston, Boston University, MIT, Sacred Heart, Boston College and University of New Hampshire.
