Opponent: IFA Championships
Location: Philadelphia, PA
Score: 5th place of 11 teams
Vortsman earns foil bronze as men's fencing places fifth at IFA championships
Sophomore Eugene Vortsman (Staten Island, N.Y.) earned the bronze medal at the Intercollegiate Fencing Championships at the University of Pennsylvania, helped the Judges to a third-place finish in the foil standings and fifth overall among the 11 teams competing.
Vortsman, seeded fourth into the individual single elimination bracket after going 6-4 in the 'A' pool, defeated No. 13 Mike Aboodi from Yale, 15-5, and No. 14 Calvin Chen of Columbia, 15-12, to reach the semifinals. After falling to top-seeded and eventual champion Ron Berkowsky of Penn, 15-12, in the semis, Vortsman bounced back to take out Princeton's Alex Vandenburg-Rhodes in the bronze-medal match, 15-8. Rookie Will Friedman was seeded ninth into the individual draw, posting an 8-2 record to win the foil 'B' pool, but ended up with a sixth-place finish despite falling to Berkowsky in the quarterfinals.
The Judges' other top performer on the day was junior Kai Keller (Bielfield, Germany), who placed fourth in the epee. Keller, the fifth seed, went 6-4 in 'A' pool play. He defeated No. 12 Johnny Beski of Yale in the first round, 15-14, and took down No. 4 Dwight Smith of Columbia, 14-9, in the quarters. Keller fell to top seed and silver medalist Ben Weider of Penn, 15-12, in the semis and dropped the third-place match, 15-8, to Harvard's Benji Ungar, the third seed.
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