POUGHKEEPSIE, NY (March 8, 2026) -- The Tufts University women's fencing team finished its 2025-26 season Sunday afternoon at Walker Field House on the campus of Vassar College, as the squad competed in the 2026 NCAA Northeast Regional.
The Jumbos had four fencers in each of the three weapons Sunday afternoon, but Tufts was unable to get any fencers through to the final pool of fencing.
Women's sabre was the first to finish on the afternoon, as the field consisted of 52 competitors with
Emily Xu,
Asher Boynton,
Anahat Bawa and
Olympe Jean competing in the field.
Round 1 featured byes for the top 17 competitors while featuring seven pools of five fencers. 18 fencers were promoted to Round 2, as Jean would move into the second pool of action after going 3-1 in the first round with a +4 indicator ratio.
Xu would not advance though, going 1-3 with a few narrow losses to have her day come to an end. Bawa was a solid 3-1 in the first round as well, as she moved into the next round after wins over Samantha Marsee of Cornell, Rachel Buhay of Boston College and Samantha Lin of Hunter.
Bawa would fare the best in the second round of sabre fencing for Tufts, going 2-4 with two close defeats as she would not advance into the third round. Jean and Boynton each would go 0-6 in the second round, though Boynton had five of the six bouts end at either 5-4 or 5-3.
Bawa would end up finishing tied for 27th, while Boynton was 33rd, Jean 34th and Xu taking 43rd place.
In epee, senior
Karen Bei led a group of
Olivia Judicke,
Emily You and
Mikayla Joseph into action Sunday. Judicke would not advance out of the first round of fencing, going 0-4 while Joseph also was eliminated after finishing 2-2 while her indicator ratio was not enough to get her through.
You was 2-2 in the opening round, but had a 15-14 touch ratio which earned her the 22nd and final Round 2 berth. In the second round, Bei would have many close bouts in the six she fenced but wasn't able to win any in going 0-6 in Round 2.
You won a pair of bouts in her pool, going 2-4 with wins over Katherine Alexandrov of Cornell and Tallulah Nguyen of Boston College, but a close loss to Yasmine Khamis of Harvard pushed her just outside of the cut line.
You finished tied for 25th to lead all epee fencers for Tufts, while Bei was 34th, Joseph 40th and Judicke 53rd.
In foil,
Layla Roy had the best day of any Tufts fencer as she finished 18th overall just missing the final pool of competition. In Round 1,
Saanvi Kapoor was 3-1 with a strong 16-10 indicator count, while
Sophie Guan and Roy were each 2-2.
Katie Han was 1-3, and would not move into the Second Round. Guan also did not advance due to her touch ratio.
In the Second Round, Roy went 3-3 with wins over Alina Zhang of Yale University, Sandra Luo of MIT and Jessica Guo of Harvard University. Her indicator count was 18-19, but it was still enough to push her into the next round of fencing.
Kapoor would not win a bout in the Second Round, as her day came to an end with a 33rd place finish. In the Third Round of pool fencing, Roy defeated Lauren Khoo of Wellesley College 5-3, but had narrow losses to Iana Lee of Cornell and Cameron Cho of Boston College as she ended up being eliminated.
The Jumbos had a strong season in 2025-26, going 26-15 in dual matches on the year.
--JUMBOS--
