by Pete LaFleur (editor@collegefencing360.com)
Fencers from the Northeast Region will compete in the final stage of qualification for the 2013 NCAA Fencing Championships (March 21-24, in San Antonio) during the 2013 NCAA Northeast Regional, to be held on Sunday, March 10, at St. John's (starting 9 a.m. ET, in Carnesecca Arena and Taffner Fieldhouse).
CLICK HERE for Northeast Regional women's entries
Here are the particulars:
• The Northeast Regional includes fencers from 18 schools that sponsor varsity fencing teams, most notably top-10 nationally ranked teams from St. John's, Columbia and Harvard … along with Boston College, Brandeis, Brown, Cornell (women only), Hunter, MIT, CCNY (women), NYU, Queens College (women), Sacred Heart, Tufts (women), Vassar, Wellesley (women), Yale and Yeshiva.
• Men's participants in the Northeast Regional are listed below (women's entries to be linked above), grouped by weapon and sorted in "seeding order" (which is based on individual results during team dual-meet competition). Fencers among the top-30 "national seeds" also are noted in the listing below.
• Each team can have a maximum of 12 men's competitors and 12 women at each Regional (distributed in any combination among the three weapon groups).
• The Northeast Region has nine allocated automatic spots in each weapon for the NCAA Championships, except men and women's epee (8 each). Each team may send a maximum of two qualifying fencers per weapon to San Antonio for the NCAAs.
• Final qualification to the NCAAs is based on two primary factors: 40% is based on each fencers mathematical season "strength factor" (prior to the Regional) while 60% is based on Regional finish. The actual strength factor numbers are based on a mathematical formula and are different from the seeding. Strength factor numbers are not made available to the public. Based on the formula, the strenght-fator gap between seeds can vary substantially (as opposed to the 1-2-3-4, etc., seeding, which is used for setting up the initial pools).
• The Northeast Regional will have an initial "play-in" phase for each weapon to produce 35 fencers in each field, followed by five pools-of-seven (top-21 advance) and then three pools-of-seven to then produce a final pool-of-12.
• In some cases, coaches may have more than two fencers fall within the top-7 qualification standard in a particular weapon, and coaches then are able to select which two fencers will represent their team in San Antonio.
• In addition to the 22 automatic qualifiers per weapon that are produced from the four Regionals, there are two at-large bids (per weapon) that will complete the 24-fencer NCAA fields in each weapon. The top-two qualifiers in each weapon (and from each region) who were not among the automatic qualifiers will be considered for the at-large spots, as long as their team does not already have two qualifiers in that weapon. At-large selections are based solely on the pre-Regional season strength factor.
• A couple years ago, Regional winners were guaranteed a spot in the NCAA Championships but the current policy is that the NCAA committee "must consider" such winners for qualification (not an automatic qualification).
Northeast Regional 2013 Men's Foil Entries
(sorted by seed, based on season strength factor)
Northeast Region receives 9 automatic m-foil allotments to NCAA Championship
1 – Michele Caporizzi (St. John's) | #9 "national seed"
2 – Michael Woo (Harvard) | 12
3 – Jerry Chang (Harvard) | 13
4 – Eli Schenkel (St. John's) | 15 ** 2011 Northeast Regional champion **
5 – Stuart Holmes (Sacred Heart) | 17
6 – Barrett Weiss (Brown) | 18
7 – Brian Kaneshige (Harvard) | 20
8 – Philip Jamesson (NYU) | 21
9 – Adam Mathieu (Columbia) | 26
10 – Harrison Bergman (Columbia)
11 – Brian Wang (Yale)
12 – Jin Ishizuka (Yale)
13 – Andrew Holmes (Sacred Heart)
14 – Julian Cardillo (Brandeis)
15 – Han Min Lee (Boston College)
16 – Max Blitzer (St. John's)
17 – Lucas Lin (Harvard)
18 – James Broughton (Yale)
19 – Patrick Riley (Boston College)
20 – Wilfred Curioso (St. John's) ** Northeast Regional defending champion **
21 – Joshua Grill (Brown)
22 – Jonathan Jacovino (Sacred Heart)
23 – Noah Berman (Brandeis)
24 – Alexander Pensler (Columbia)
25 – Kyle Kennedy (Brown)
26 – Christian Vastola (NYU)
27 – Andrew Ark (NYU)
28 – Dillon Lew (Yale)
29 – Ethan Levy (Brandeis)
30 – Alexander Harwood (Sacred Heart)
31 – James Golin (Brown)
32 – Matthew Steinschneider (Vassar)
33 – Peter Wetzel (Boston College)
34 – Alexander Siy (MIT)
35 – Scott Robinson (MIT)
36 – Alex Vastola (Vassar)
37 – Trequan Artis (Vassar)
38 – Sam Larson (Yeshiva)
note – Former Yale fencer Nathianiel Botwinick won the 2010 Northeast Regional men's foil title (Columbia alum Shefif Farrag was the 2009 Northeast Regional champion)
Northeast Regional 2013 Men's Epee Entries
(sorted by seed, based on season strength factor)
Northeast Region receives 8 automatic m-epee allotments to NCAA Championship
1 – Brian Ro (Columbia) | #1 "national seed"
2 – Adam Watson (St. John's) | 2
3 – Alen Hadzic (Columbia) | 7
4 – Justin Wan (Columbia) | 11
5 – Jake Hoyle (Columbia) | 12
6 – Mike Raynis (Harvard) | 16
7 – Joseph Rafidi (MIT) | 18
8 – Peter Cohen (Yale University) | 24
9 – Simon Jones (Brown) | 27
10 – Ben White (Harvard) | 28
11 – Kelly McGuire (Brown) | 29
12 – Cornelius Saunders (Yale)
13 – Tavish Pegram (Vassar)
14 – Kevin Almerini (Sacred Heart)
15 – Jackson Crane (MIT)
16 – Kristopher White (Sacred Heart)
17 – Benjamin Mappin-Kasirer (Yale)
18 – Peregrine Badger (Harvard) ** Northeast Regional defending champion **
19 – Trevor Shepard (St. John's)
20 – Michael Fenech (Sacred Heart)
21 – Andrew Dobbie (St. John's)
22 – Jack Greenfield (MIT)
23 – Jeremiah German (Sacred Heart)
24 – Nikhil Patel (Boston College)
25 – Ari Feingirsh (Brandeis)
26 – Albert Starshak (Boston College)
27 – Evan Accardi (NYU)
28 – Jonathan Philippou (NYU)
29 – Richmond.Woodward (NYU)
30 – Benjamin McDonald (Brown)
31 – Harry Kaufer (Brandeis)
32 – Tom Herarne (Brandeis)
33 – MIke Zook (Brandeis)
34 – Dylan Nelson-Epstein (Hunter)
35 – Anthony Musto (Hunter)
36 – Alan Leidner (Yeshiva)
note – Former St. John's fencer Nicholas Vomero was the 2011 Northeast Regional men's epee champion … fencers from Harvard won the Northeast Regional titles in 2010 (James Hawrot) and 2011 (Karl Harmenberg)
Northeast Regional 2013 Men's Sabre Entries
(sorted by seed, baed on season strength factor)
M-A/S Region receives 9 automatic m-sabre allotments to NCAA Championship
1 – Daryl Homer (St. John's) | #1 "national seed" ** Northeast Regional champ '09-'10-'11 ('10 & '11 NCAA champ)
2 – Sean Buckley (St. John's) | 2
3 – Eric Arzoian (Harvard) | 9 ** Northeast Regional defending champion **
4 – Alexander Ryjik (Harvard) | 13
5 – Adam Mandel (Brandeis) | 19
6 – William Spear (Columbia) | 21
7 – Geoffrey Loss (Columbia) | 24
8 – Michael Josephs (Columbia) | 28
9 – Andrew Kelly (NYU) | 30
10 – Nathaniel Benzimra (Yale)
11 – Denis Dukhalov (Brown)
12 – Hugh O'Cinneide (Yale)
13 – Jess Ochs-Willard (Brandeis)
14 – Nicholas Deak (Brown)
15 – Stryker "Teddy" Weller (Brown)
16 – Charles Efthimion (NYU)
17 – Thomas Gerry (Sacred Heart)
18 – Jerry Xu (NYU)
19 – Ehsan Izadmehr (MIT)
20 – Ben Loft (Brandeis)
21 – John Arden (Vassar)
22 – Devin Midgley (Boston College)
23 – Ryan O'Halloran (Sacred Heart)
24 – Denis McGovern (Boston College)
25 – Stephan Teng (NYU)
26 – William Zhao (Yale)
27 – Zach Wilson (Vassar)
28 – Daniel O'Malley (MIT)
29 – Alexis Chavez (Hunter)
30 – Isaac Orbe (Hunter College)
31 – Laphonchai Jirachuphun (MIT)
32 – Benjamin Rozenshteyn (Yeshiva)
33 – Asher Perez (Yeshiva)
34 – Daniel Levine (Yeshiva)
35 – Michael Farnoosh (Yeshiva)