RESULTS:
Final Team
Individual Women's Sabre
Individual Men's Sabre
Individual Women's Epee
Individual Men's Epee
Individual Women's Foil
Individual Men's Foil

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- Detroit fencers competed at the Midwest Fencing Conference Championships this past weekend at Notre Dame. Michael Purdy-Sachs of men's foil earned All-Conference second team honors as the top Titan individual finisher on Saturday and he helped the men's foil team place fourth in the team events on Sunday.
 
Purdy-Sachs went 5-0 in pool play allowing just four touches against him in the opening round. A tough field meant he was seeded sixth in the direct elimination (DE) round. His first round of the DE saw him dispose of his opponent 15-0, and then downed Travis Wittenburg of Indiana, 15-5. He advanced one more time defeating Gabriel Acuta from Notre Dame 15-11 but would have his run end in the semifinals to Chris Colley of Ohio State by a 15-12 score to earn the tie for fifth place.
 
In the team event, Purdy-Sachs and Yaroslav Ivanov combined to be a deadly one-two punch as the men's foil squad was originally seeded 11th. Ivanov has fenced epee this year and was moved to foil prior to this weekend's competition and the lower seed allowed the Titans to face some higher competition. 

“We were seeded pretty low at No. 11 and Michigan State was excited because they were seeded No. 6, but then they saw our roster and we ruined people's day,” said fencing head coach Todd Dressell.
 
And ruin people's day they did as the Titans went on to upset the No. 6 seed, Michigan State, by a 5-2 score and advanced to face the No. 3 seed from Indiana. The Hoosiers would also fall victim to Detroit by a 5-2 margin and push the Titans against the hosts from Notre Dame in the semifinals. The Irish jumped out to a 4-0 lead before Purdy-Sachs scored one point but a 5-1 final would end the Titan hopes of a first place finish. Detroit would fall 5-3 to Wayne State to finish in fourth place in the foil after placing third a year ago.
 
Ivanov ended up finishing 22nd individually in men's foil who went 3-2 in pool play. He went on to win his first DE, 15-3 over Mark Hoyer before succumbing to Acuta. A win over Acuta and Purdy-Sachs and Ivanov would have matched up against each other for a chance to be in the semifinals.
 
“I would have liked to see a better result from Ivanov but for a guy who has not fenced much foil all year, he did reasonable well,” said Dressell.
 
Men's sabre fencer Frank Adamini was able to come up with his best performance of the season as he started 3-2 in pool play. The better pool play record earned him the 34th seed heading in the DE round. His first DE saw him win 15-12 over Jake Thygesen who was seeded 30th. That advanced Adamini to face Rhys Douglas, who was tied for the second seed in the DE round. While Douglas captured the win, Adamini still posted three points against the elite fencer.
 
“The surprise of the day was Frank. He went in there and just had a spectacular pool round and won his first DE and because he had a good seed, he had a good first DE and did real well,” said Dressell.
 
On the women's side, Ariel Skellett had the best individual result as she finished tied for 21st in women's sabre. All three sabreists finished close as Eva Berndt was 26th and Katie Lang placed 33rd. The women also featured two other fencers in the top 30 in their weapon as Paige Zmudczynski of women's epee placed 28th and Shannon Canavan of women's foil was 29th.
 
“The women are really starting to get what we have been working on in terms of being more aggressive and being more decisive in what they are trying to do and its starting to come out. Kaylah Berndt had a couple of nice wins and I think it is really going to help her confidence going forward,” stated Dressell.
 
The Detroit Titan fencers will have a select group head to the NCAA Midwest Regionals to be held Feb. 10-11 at Cleveland State University.