Over the March 11th and 12th weekend, NCAA regional events took place across the country with one purpose: to solidify the field of 144 fencers for the 2017 Men’s and Women’s NCAA Fencing Championships. This year’s event will be held at the Indiana Farmers Coliseum in Indianapolis, Indiana, hosted by the University of Notre Dame and Indiana Sports Corp from March 23rd through 26th.
The format for the NCAA championships consists of one large 24 person round-robin 5-touch pool for every weapon. The top 4 seeds from each pool will be placed into a DE bracket to determine 1st through 3rd (tie). School overall results are based on total pool bout wins from all athletes from each school, with global school indicator (all touches scored by all athletes minus all touches received) used in the event of a tie.
This year, the event will be anchored by Notre Dame and Columbia, who have both qualified the maximum number of fencers possible for this event, giving them the best chance at taking home 1st place for overall team. Additionally, this event features five 2016 Olympians (Lee Kiefer, Alexander Massialas, Kat Holmes, Eli Dershwitz, and Elanor Harvey), as well as 7 previous NCAA champions (not including Olympians).
The field is both strong and diverse this year. While the Olympians and past NCAA champs are odds-on favorites, it’ll certainly be a tight race to the top for each weapon. The CollegeFencing360 March 9th Coach’s Poll puts Ohio State men’s team at a strong #1, with Penn State and Columbia at a tight second and third, respectively. On the Women’s side, Princeton comes out on top, with Columbia and Notre Dame following fairly close behind at second and third, respectively.
The regional events held this weekend qualified individuals for the Championships based on a pre-determined allocation schedule – not every region qualifies the same number of fencers. Qualification is dependent upon participation and results. Generally speaking, the Northeast region qualifies approximately 8 fencers per event; Mid-Atlantic/South qualifies approximately 7, Midwest 5, West gets 2, and there are 2 more At-Large qualifiers. The Northeast event was held at Yale this year, Mid-Atlantic/South at Lafayette College, Midwest at Wayne State University and West at Stanford.
NCAA Regional Qualifier Results
Northeast Regional Qualifier Results
Mid-West Regional Qualifier Results
Mid-Atlantic/South Regional Qualifier Results
West Regional Qualifier Results
Once they are active, you’ll be able to view the live results for the NCAA Championship event here.
ESPN3 and the WatchESPN app will be live streaming the semi-final and final brackets as they occur. An event highlight and recap show will air on ESPNU on April 5th at 2:30pm ET.
Other NCAA recaps can be found at NCAA.com and US Fencing.
And we’d like to welcome anyone interested in joining our own home-grown 2017 NCAA Fantasy Fencing Draft!
