Northwestern University Athletics
Wildcats Qualify Five For NCAA Championships
3/11/2009 12:00:00 AM | Women's Fencing
March 11, 2009
2009 NCAA Championships Press Release 
EVANSTON, Ill. -- At the beginning of the season, Northwestern head coach Laurie Schiller said his goal was to qualify five or six fencers for the NCAA Championships in University Park, Pa., later this month. Coach Schiller got his wish as five Wildcats will compete in the Championships, set for March 19-22 on the Penn State campus.
Senior Sam Nemecek (Caledonia, Mich./Caledonia) will look to cap off her illustrious Wildcat career by capturing her fourth-straight All-American honor after being named a second-team as a freshman, sophomore and junior. Nemecek, the Midwest Conference foil champion, not only finished second at the NCAA Midwest Regional in Columbus, Ohio, this past weekend, but in the process surpassed Jessica Florendo as Northwestern's all-time wins leader. She enters the Championships with an overall record of 413-66, and her .862 winning percentage is tops all-time in the program's history. Nemecek has finished in the top-10 in the country every year of her Wildcat career, posting a seventh-place finish in 2007 and eighth-place finishes in 2006 and 2008.
Nemecek will be joined in the foil by freshman Devynn Patterson (Seattle, Wash./Roosevelt), who finished 47-15 in her first year with the 'Cats. Patterson posted a 10-1 record in the individual competition of the Midwest Conference Championships to finish in a tie for third, while finishing ninth at the Midwest Regional.
Both of the French sisters will represent the epée squad for Northwestern at the NCAA Championships. Christa French (Southlake, Texas/Carroll) was second on the team in wins this year with a 72-15 record, and finished third at the Midwest Conference Championships. She followed that up with a fifth-place finish at the Midwest Regional. Christa will be making her third appearance in the Championships, posting a sixth-place finish in 2007 and placing 10th in 2008, en route to being named a second-team All-American both times.
Kayley French (Southlake, Texas/Carroll) makes her second trip to nationals after finishing 14th in her freshman campaign. She was second among Wildcat epéeists with a 62-26 record this season and notched a sixth-place finish at both the Midwest Conference Championships and the NCAA Midwest Regional.
Junior Whitney White (Wyckoff, N.J./Ramapo) will represent the Northwestern sabre squad, making her first trip to the NCAA Championships after posting an impressive 60-36 in 2009. White placed seventh at the Midwest Conference Championships, and followed up by placing eighth at the Midwest Regional.
Fencers will compete in a round-robin format of five-touch bouts. After the round-robin, the top four fencers in each event will fence direct elimination 15-touch bouts for first, second and third places. Absolute ties for the seeding will be broken as follows: for positions one through three, by a coin toss; for position four, by a fence-off. An institution's place finish in the championships will be based on points earned by each individual. A team will be awarded one point for each victory by its student-athletes for the duration of the championships.
Fans can track the progress of their Wildcat fencers at the NCAA Championships page.
