In somewhat of an up and down weekend for the fencing team, the Red emerged with a 2-2 record, improving to 11-4 overall.
The weekend opened with a triple header for Cornell which included Princeton, James Madison, and Fairleigh Dickinson.
The fencers were swept by the Tigers in the first match of the day but responded with two very strong victories in its final two contests.
In the Princeton match, the Tigers dominated the foil event 8-1 but saw the Red battle back in the two remaining events to win by a 6-3 margin in both the saber and epee competitions.
Roopa Rangi went 2-1 in the epee event in exciting fashion, defeating the Tigers’ Kristiina Hurme 5-4 in one match.
Lily Nierenberg lead the saber division also winning two of her matches by the slim 5-4 margin.
Ellyn Rajfer, playing in her hometown of Princeton, N.J., had the sole victory for the Red in the foil competition, winning by an impressive score of 5-1 against Crystal Jiang.
The foil squad was thirsty for revenge against FDU, and accordingly barreled through the competition, sweeping all nine matches.
Rajfer and Tara Hatami were both particularly dominant in the division, winning their six matches by a combined score of 30-2.
The epee squad had a harder time with the FDU fencers, winning 6-3, but the contest of the day was in the saber competition, in which the score was tied 4-4 going into the final match.
Elinor Granzow emerged as the hero, winning the final saber duel, 5-3, against Cathleen Ferris.
In the final match of the day, the Red once again showed very well, winning impressively in two of the three competitions.
The epee team won big 8-1 behind victories from Rangi and Patricia Blumenauer.
Hatami and Rajfer once again led the foil squad en-route to a 7-2 victory.
The saber competition was close for the second time in a day, seeing Cornell win another tight one by one decisive point.
“This is the most solid team I’ve had since I’ve been here and they showed why that is coming back like they did [Sunday] after the loss to Princeton,” commented an impressed head coach Al Peters.
The weekend ended yesterday against Harvard, in a very difficult match for the Red.
Harvard won the match 21-6, sweeping all three competitions. The bright spot for Cornell was Patricia Blumenauer who went 2-1 in the epee competition.
Peters was optimistic about the loss remarking, “The score was not indicative of the tremendous effort we put in today against a very strong opponent.”
The Red returns to action in two weeks at Penn State in a five team competition.
It will also face Penn, Columbia, and Temple over the course of that very exhausting weekend.
Archived article by Sun Staff