Columbia Hopes To Take Two

After claiming men's title, Columbia looks to do the same in women's event

March 23, 2007

By Carolyn Braff

Special to CSTV.com

	Carolyn Braff Carolyn is an assistant editor and writer for CSTV.com. E-mail here!

        ---   Column Archive   --- SOFTBALL 01/24: Modeling The Right Role FOOTBALL 01/15: Getting Somewhere 01/07: The Home Team vs. The Road Warrior 01/01: Singing The Maize And Blues 12/27: Up-Downs For Texas 12/18: Lying In Wait 12/11: Warrior Green: The New Boise Blue 12/8: Best Of The Rest 12/4: A Winning Preparation 11/27: Easy Road To The Big Easy 11/20: Running The Backup and Crashing 11/13: Least Common Denominators 11/6: Throw The Ducks A Bone 10/30: Boise Is Back 10/23: They've Got Guts 10/16: Kansas Full of Cupcakes 10/9: Pay Attention To The Men Behind The Curtain 10/2: Not-Such-Surprises 9/25: Irish Inflation 9/18: The Star and The Slump 9/11: Four's No Crowd 9/4: Unmatched Matchups 8/22: No Peterson, No Problem For Oklahoma 8/22: Catch Him If You Can 8/21: Running A Reverse 8/20: Big 12 Conference Preview 8/8: Still No Cigar 8/8: Going and Coming 8/8: C-USA Conference Preview 6/17: Pennsylvania Wins Not-So-Big 33 LACROSSE 5/5: Tigers Limp Into Playoffs 4/7: Home, Sweet Home 3/3: Hoyas Hold On For Another Win 2/16: Accelerating Development 2/15: One More Chance For This Mid 2/12: Wildcats Favored For Three in a Row BASKETBALL 3/21: Winona State Still Streaking in Postseason 3/19: Cruising to Perfection 1/14: Penn Has The Tempo To a T 1/12: Columbia Thwarts The Three, Downs Princeton FENCING 3/25: A Rematch to Be Remembered 3/23: Columbia Hopes to Take Two CROSS COUNTRY 9/7: Luck Be A Lambie 9/4: Bringing Charm To The Farm 9/4: Breaking In 9/3: Room to Run GOLF 6/13: Looking The Part

MADISON, N.J. - Fencing is an individual sport, but for the newly distinguished men's national champions, it's all about the team.

The six members of Columbia's men's team that qualified for the NCAA Championships, held this weekend at Drew University in Madison, N.J., fenced their way through a grueling round-robin tournament that pits each fencer against each of the other 23 finest athletes in the nation.

"It's a tough competition," Columbia head coach George Kolombatovich said. "To go up against 23 guys, it's not only physically exhausting, but mentally it's really tough to keep your head up and really go at it constantly."

The Lions successfully kept their heads on the strip, fencing their way to a tournament-best 93 points to earn the men's team the national title, which is not conferred until after the women's competition concludes on Sunday. After seven exhausting rounds over the past two days, the men secured a comfortable four-bout lead for their team, which the women will add to their points when competition begins for them tomorrow. The team title belongs to Columbia, but as individuals, none of the Lions earned the right to fight for the gold medal.

"I wish that I could have done more to contribute," said Columbia senior Alex Krul, who finished twelfth in the sabre competition. "I had an off-day. It wasn't the caliber of the competition, it just wasn't my day."

Krul finished in sixth place in each of his last two NCAA Championship appearances.

Despite Krul's uncharacteristically inconsistent performance, all six Columbia fencers were named All-Americans at the end of the competition.

 "It's nice for our last year to finish first, overall I couldn't have been happier," said senior James Williams, who finished seventh in the sabre event. "It was unfortunate. I didn't fence today as well as I would have liked to. I just dropped one or two bouts in a few moments of indecision. I'm sort of upset with that, but I'm really happy with us overall as a team."

Kolombatovich, however, was not at all upset with his players' individual performances.

"I'm not going to complain at all, I was just thrilled with everybody's performance," Kolombatovich said. "I was not particularly upset about it. One of our strengths this year has been looking toward the team title. It's a funny situation, since you fence both the individual and team competition at the same time."

The situation in the sabre competition was made even more peculiar when NYU's Jared Hammond left the tournament with a concussion after fencing only 14 of his 23 bouts. Because of the dual nature of the competition, the bouts he completed count towards his opponents' scores, but the nine fencers who did not face him had no chance to reclaim those points. Williams was one of those nine.

"James would have beaten him, he was not very strong at all," Kolombatovich said. "With those wins, [Williams] would have jumped all the way to fourth," which would have put the senior in the elimination round for the gold medal.

The Lions' best individual performances came in the foil competition, as Kurt Gets finished third and Scott Sugimoto was fourth, placing them both in the final four round to determine the national champion. Both lost in their opening bout, pitting the teammates against each other in the consolation match to determine the bronze medal winner. And that's not the first time these teammates have squared off against each other on the strip.

"That happens quite a bit," Kolombatovich said. "At the Eastern Collegiate championships they fenced each other for the gold medal. A lot of our fencers are involved both nationally and internationally, so they end up fencing each other."

Coming at the end of such an intense team competition, however, the individual title mattered far less for both athletes, and neither put out his best effort.

"Both of them had nothing left," Kolombatovich said. "Everything in their bodies, in their souls, they had put out for the team. Their bout for the bronze medal here was sort of sad because neither one of them really wanted to win it. Nobody was really going out and fighting for it. They're best friends. They just spent two days of intense stuff working together and feeding off of each other extremely well.

"What happens in the individuals is when the team does really well, your excitement, your adrenaline, there's nothing left. It's kind of a `who cares' kind of thing. Obviously it's the national championship, you care, but this team has been so looking forward to the team championship, they've only talked about team goals this year."

The Lions will have to wait another two days to see if their goals will come to fruition. The undefeated women's team will take the strip beginning tomorrow to do what they can to secure the dual championship.