March 15, 2011
Contact: Dan Carr
CLEVELAND, Ohio - Cleveland State senior John Marshall is one of 24 collegiate fencers who have been selected to compete in the epee discipline at the 2011 NCAA Fencing Championships. The NCAA made the announcement on Tuesday (March 15).
"It was basically his dream to compete at the NCAAs, and I'm glad that he has the opportunity," head coach Andy Tulleners said. "John's worked hard this season, and had worked hard his entire career at Cleveland State, to get to the NCAAs."
Qualification for the NCAA Championships is made up of two components: 60% of the decision is based on how a fencer performs at the NCAA Regional Qualifiers, while the other 40% consists of production during the season. Marshall placed seventh in the epee division at the NCAA Midwest Regional Qualifiers last Sunday (March 13) and finished the regular season with a 78-11 overall record.
"This season, John has had the strongest results he's ever achieved at Cleveland State," Tulleners said. "He will be competing on equal footing with the other fencers who qualified for the championships."
The National Collegiate Men's and Women's Fencing Championships include individual events in each of the six weapons (men's foil, men's epee, men's sabre, women's foil, women's epee, women's sabre).
Fencers will compete in a round-robin format of five-touch bouts. After the round-robin, the top-four fencers fence semifinal 15-touch bouts, with the winners fencing to determine first and second places, and the losers being awarded a tie for third place. 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.
"This will be a very tough event," Tulleners said. "I'm looking forward to seeing how he does."
The 2011 NCAA Fencing Championships will be hosted by Ohio State at the French Field House and St. John Arena from March 24-27. The action will be video streamed live at NCAA.com.
This is the second consecutive year, and the second time in Tulleners' three-year tenure as head coach, that Cleveland State has had a fencer qualify for the NCAA championships. Last season, Liran Gross represented the Vikings in the foil discipline, winning three bouts and placing 24th.
