M. Fencers Crushed

Imagine the Harvard men's basket-ball team defeating the Boston Celtics.

That's what the Harvard men's fencing team beating defending national champion Columbia would have been like, Coach Branimir Zivkovic said after the squad's 24-3 loss.

Coming off victories last week over Brandeis and MIT, the fencers (now 5-1) just didn't have the strength to topple the nation's top-ranked team.

"They have a very strong team, and we just didn't have enough time to prepare for such a tough match," said senior starter Jim O'Neill, who posted a 2-1 record. "We were tried."

"We got pounded on," senior starter Arthur Miller said. "They just overpowered us. They're a lot deeper team than we are."

Critical to the outcome was Harvard's 0-9 record in saber matches. Fencing tournaments are based on 3 types of events--saber, foil, and epee--each worth nine points. Teams need at least 14 points to win a match.

Demoralizing

"We had a very young saber team, and that was a crucial point," Zivkovic exlained. "When you lose nine in one weapon, it demoralizes the other teams."

But despite the sound defeat, Zivkovic said that the squad's performance was as good as could be expected.

"We did pretty well, if not a little better than I'd hoped, not to mention the fact that Columbia is not an average team," Zivkovic said.