• Northwestern All-American Samantha Nemecek finished atop the MFC women's foil competition, emerging from a final-16 group that included seven of her Wildcat teammates, plus four each from Notre Dame and Ohio State. Nemecek entered the competition as the #2 seed and was #4 heading into the direct-elimination, after going 6-0/+26 in her pool bouts. She went on to proceed through the DE, with her final bouts including a 15-6 win over ND's Radmilla Sarkisova (#13 DE seed) in the round-of-16, a 15-11 quarterfinal vs. ND's Emilie Prot (co-#4 DE seed), a 15-12 semifinal victory over top-seeded Lindsay Knauer (OSU) and the 15-12 title bout vs. ND's Hayley Reese (#11). Reese entered the MFCs seeded #3, while Knauer was #4, Sarkisova #8 and Prot #9.
• Reese (6-1 in pools/+22) saw her seed drop eight spots, due to a 3-4 pool loss against Northwestern's Irisa Chen (#19 initial seed) ... the ND All-American then rattled off five straight wins, including a 15-5, round-of-16 upset (based on DE seed) vs. Northwestern's Camille Provencal-Dayle (#6), and two more upsets in the quarterfinals (15-8 vs. #2 seed Oksana Dmytruk, of OSU) and the semifinals (15-2 vs. Northwestern's Devynn Patterson, the co-#2 seed). Dmytruk was the runner-up in the 2008 NCAA women's foil competition.
• Nemecek and Reese both scored upsets (based on DE seeds) in the quarterfinal and semifinal rounds, but the other two quartefinals went to the higher seed – as Knauer beat Northwestern's Ariel Stein (#9) in a 13-4 bout while #2 Patterson outlasted #10 Meredith Baskies in a 10-6 defensive battle between the Northwestern teammates.
• All 16 of the DE seeds advanced to the final-16, which included 13 of the initial top-16 seeds. Three Northwesterns fencers who had initial seeds outside the top-16 went on to reach the round-of-16: Rebecca Grohman (#46 intitial seed/#15 DE seed), Lisa Sachs (#26/#12) and Chen (#19/#8). Grohman went 5-1/+18 in the pools, Sachs was 6-1/+23 and Chen was unbeaten in the opening phase (7-0/+22, with the big win over Reese).
• The fencers who were initial top-16 teams but failed to reach the final-16 included ND's Katie Heinzen (#13) and Lawrence's Dorothea Schurr. Heinzen went 4-2/+6 in the pools (with a 3-4 loss to Baskies and an 0-5 loss vs. another Northwestern fencer, Molly Barrett), ultimately finishing 25th after a round-of-32 loss to OSU's Holly McKibben (7-15). Schurr also was 4-2/+16 in the pools and went on to place 23rd, following a 1-15 loss to Stein.
MFC Women's Foil Round-of-16
(1) Lindsay Knauer (NW) def. (16) Isabella Bonello (OSU) ... 15-8
(2) Devynn Patterson (NW) def. (15) Recebba Grohman (NW) ... 14-9
(2) Oksana Dmytruk (OSU) def. (14) Darsie Malynn (ND) ... 10-9
(4) Emilie Prot (ND) def. (13) Radmilla Sarkisova (ND) ... 15-2
(4) Samantha Nemecek (NW) def. (12) Lisa Sachs (NW) ... 15-6
(11) Hayley Reese (ND) def. (6) Camille Provencal-Dayle (NW) ... 15-5
(10) Meredith Baskies (NW) def. (7) Holly McKibben (OSU) ... 15-6
(9) Ariel Stein (NW) def. (9) Irisa Chen (NW) ... 15-6
Quarterfinals
(1) Lindsay Knauer (NW) def. (9) Ariel Stein (NW) ... 13-4
(2) Devynn Patterson (NW) def. (10) Meredith Baskies (NW) ... 10-6
(4) Samantha Nemecek (NW) def. (4) Emilie Prot (ND) ... 15-11
(11) Hayley Reese (ND) def. (2) Oksana Dmytruk (OSU) ... 15-8
Semifinals
(11) Hayley Reese (ND) def. (2) Devynn Patterson (NW) ... 15-2
(4) Samantha Nemecek (NW) def. (1) Lindsay Knauer (OSU) ... 15-12
Finals
(4) Samantha Nemecek (NW) def. (11) Hayley Reese (ND) ... 15-12
2009 MFC Women's Foil Final Top-16 Data (field of 72)
1. Samantha Nemecek (Northwestern) ... #2 initial seed/#4 pre-DE ... 6-0 in pools (+26)
2. Hayley Reese (Notre Dame) ... #3/#11 ... 6-1 in pools (+22)
3. Lindsay Knauer (Ohio State) ... #4/#1 ... 7-0 in pools (+31)
3. Devynn Patterson (NW) ... #5/#2 ... 6-0 in pools (+27)
5. Oksana Dmytruk (OSU) ... #1/#2 ... 6-0 in pools (+27)
6. Emilie Prot (ND) ... #9/#4 ... 6-0 in pools (+26)
7. Ariel Stein (NW) ... #12/#9 ... 6-0 in pools (+22)
8. Meredith Baskies (NW) ... #10/#10 ... 6-0 in pools (+20)
9. Camille Provencal-Dayle (NW) ... #6/#6 ... 6-0 in pools (+24)
10. Holly McKibben (OSU) ... #11/#7 ... 6-0 in pools (+23)
11. Irisa Chen (NW) ... #19/#8 ... 7-0 in pools (+22)
12. Lisa Sachs (NW) ... #26/#12 ... 6-1 in pools (+12)
13. Radmila Sarkisova (ND) ... #8/#13 ... 5-1 in pools (+21)
14. Darsie Malynn (ND) ... #7/#14 ... 5-1 in pools (+21)
15. Rebecca Grohman (NW) ... #46/#15 ... 5-1 in pools (+18)
16. Isabella Bonello (OSU) ... #16/#16 ... 5-1 (+16)