Ramapo Fencers Win First Round of State Team Championship

Earlier this week, the Ramapo fencing team won its District Championship for the 11th Year in a Row. This week, the team won the first round of its state championship tournament. Coach Paul Apostol submitted to Patch the following wrap up of the state meet.

Eighth seeded Ramapo went up against thirteenth seeded Millburn, established an early lead and relentlessly added to their lead in every round. Based on Cetrulo results Ramapo had much stronger sabre and epee squads, and a foil squad that did much worse than Millburn in the Cetrulo, suggesting a slight advantage for Ramapo.  Ramapo sabreists went 2-1 in the first round, while Raider epeeists swept all three of their bouts and foilists did better than expected with a 2-1 record to end the round at 7-2 Ramapo. 

In the second round Ramapo fencers extended their lead to 13-5, as the sabreists swept all three of their bouts while the epeeist went 2-1 and the foilists went 1-2. In the second sabre bout of the third round Alex Gorloff clinched the meet at 14-6 as he scored a decisive 5-1 victory over his Millburn opponent. 

Ramapo sabreists and epeeists produced 2-1 records in the third round and the foilists went 1-2 to finish the meet at 18-9. The big swing in performance was by the Ramapo foil squad, which while going 4-5 did much better than prior results would have suggested.

Ramapo sabreists went 2-1 in the first round as senior Chris Muller produced an easy 5-2 win, while junior,  Adam Carcione had to work a little harder for his 5-3 win. Unfortunately, senior Alex Gorloff lost his only bout of the season to Millburn’s Alex Goldman, a good fencer but one who was very lucky in his bout against Alex when he benefited from three closeouts. A close out occurs when there is an accidental crashing of the bell guards that results in one sabre scoring while the other does not. 

It is not something that occurs on purpose but unfortunately even accidental touches count. The sabreists went 3-0 in the second round with Alex and Chris winning their bouts by overpowering scores of 5-1 each. In the third round Alex and Adam won again with each of them dominating their opponents with 5-1 scores. For the entire meet Adam was undefeated with a 3-0 record while Alex and Chris contributed two victories apiece for an overall sabre result of 7-2.

Raider epeeists also produced an overall 7-2 record, sweeping the first round and going 2-1 in both the second and third rounds. Junior, Adam Polevoy was undefeated with a 3-0 record. He won his first two bouts with comfortable leads of 5-2, but had to work harder for his final 5-4 victory. Senior, Matt Martone produced two victories including his third round bout when he closed down his opponent with a 5-0 win. Senior, Michael Daly also produced two victories, one of which was an exciting come from behind win where he managed to defeat his opponent after being down 3-4.

A comparison of the foil records of Ramapo and Millburn at Cetrulo would have suggested a Millburn rout at today’s meet. That did not happen, principally because of outstanding fencing by Ramapo senior, Dan Kim who swept all three of his bouts today. Dan had to fight hard for his first two victories, which he won by 5-3 and 5-4 but he cruised to an overwhelming 5-0 victory in his third bout. Eugene Won contributed one victory to complete the 4-5 performance by the foil squad. This record is what made the difference between a very close meet and one that was relatively easy.

With the overall field now reduced to the top 8 schools in the State (out of 48), our next competitor will be 5th ranked Gov. Livingston, a very tough competitor. Compared to our 2nd place sabre finish at Cetrulo, Gov. Livingston finished 6th, two places higher than today’s Millburn sabreists. In epee, compared to Ramapo’s 8th place finish at Cetrulo, Gov. Livingston finished 21st, a much weaker finish than today’s opponents. The crunch for Ramapo comes in foil where Gov. Livingston finished 3rd compared to today’s Millburn opponents who finished 5th. It should be a close match.

Our next meet, the State Team Championship meet against Gov. Livingston, will be Monday, Feb. 10, at 5 PM at home. 

Ramapo’s prior victories: Nyack 17-10 (14-7), W. Milford 17-10 (14-5) Passaic Valley 17-10 (14-5), Don Bosco 20-7 (14-7), Pompton Lakes 19-8 (14-0), Fair Lawn 21-6 (14-4), Indian Hills 16-11 (14-4), Wayne Hills 18-9 (14-7), W. Milford 18-9 (14-5).