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The University of Detroit Mercy men's fencing team was paced by a ninth-place finish from the foil squad and placed 13th overall as the Midwest Fencing Conference Championships reached its conclusion on Sunday afternoon.

The Titan men accumulated a total of 235 points, led by the foil squad who tallied 130. Notre Dame won the men's championships with 660 points, and was also the combined team champion with 1,310 points. Detroit's men's and women's teams combined for a 12th-place finish with 520 points.

“We were expecting to do better than we did today,” said UDM head coach Todd Dressell. “We fenced well, but in several weapons we lost our opening match and ended up in the losers' bracket. That's something that's really very difficult to overcome and leaves you at a major disadvantage.”

The men's foil team of junior Brad Coon (Jenison, MI/Hudsonville), sophomore Michael Purdy-Sachs (Port Huron, MI/Home School) and freshman Jared Sivec (Macomb, MI/Dakota) stumbled out of the gate, dropping a 5-4 decision to Purdue in their opening match of the team competition, but rebounded to win their next three matches. Coon, Purdy-Sachs and Sivec topped Oberlin 5-1, Chicago 5-2 and outdueled Illinois to take ninth-place by a score of 5-3. Their ninth-place finish just missed matching Detroit's finish in the foil last year, when Coon and Purdy-Sachs teamed with current assistant coach Craig Budzynski for eighth.

In the sabre field, senior Dan Bingham (St. Clair Shores, MI/Fraser) and junior Tom Lorenzo (Avon, OH/St. Ignatius) had to make due without senior Doug Sollman (Sterling Hts., MI/Stevenson) on Sunday, but still managed to post a 1-3 mark on the day and a 14th-place finish. Sollman was left unable to compete after taking a sabre through the hand during the individual competition Saturday and requiring stitches. Bingham and Lorenzo dropped their first two matches but edged out Lawrence, 5-4, to advance to the 13th-place match, where they were in turn edged by Illinois, 5-4.

“Doug has been the anchor of our sabre squad all year,” said Dressell. “This was one of those situations where it's very unfortunate that he was unable to compete, and you just have to hope that the other guys can step up and get the job done, but it was too much to overcome to fence shorthanded.”

Freshman Tim Nelson (Riverview, MI/Gabriel Richard) competed on his own in the epee, earning the Titans an 18th-place finish in the team competition.

“With only one guy you can only fence in three bouts during each match, but some of the other teams only had one fencer as well,” Dressell said. “And Tim as well as he could have, winning every bout he fenced.”

Detroit will return to Evanson, IL, and Northwestern University on Saturday for the NCAA Regional Qualifier, where the pressure will be off for some of the Titans.

“I really put a lot of pressure on our whole team for the conference championships,” said Dressell. “But the level of competition at the regional is just extraordinary, and we will work hard this week and try to do well with the fencers we with us, but we can go in a bit more relaxed and just fence.”

Purdy-Sachs, however, will be fencing at the regional meet with the hopes of earning a bid to the NCAA Championships from March 25-28.