Sports sports blitz

Playoffs, new seasons, and honors in sight for Engineers

MIT teams performed well in the clutch to earn individual and team honors, highlighted February with gritty moments

By Ahaan Rungta Feb. 22, 2018

Women's Swimming andΒ Diving (5–5, 3–0 NEWMAC) fell to Amherst College on senior day, but the Engineers sent an all-time record of 15 student athletes to the NEWMAC Academic All-Conference team. The honorees were Jessica Chen ’18, Mary Thielking ’18, Addie Chambers ’19, Kim Feng ’19, Morgan Matranga ’19, Dolly Payne ’19, Clare Wieland ’19, Delaney Burns ’20, Kayla Holman ’20, Alexandrine Obrand ’20, Lilia Staszel ’20, Nanette Wu ’20, Priscilla Wu ’20, Emily Zhang ’20, and Blake Zhou ’20.

Men’s Basketball (20–5, 10–4 NEWMAC) is back in the winning groove, thanks in large part to AJ Jurko ’19, who earned well-deserved NEWMAC Offensive Player of the Week honors. The last time he accomplished that feat was a couple of weeks ago. The Engineers will face a familiar foe when they collide inΒ a semifinal matchup against the No. 2, Babson.

Men’s Fencing (15–9, 8–2 NEWMAC) displayed grit at the Beanpot, despite some losses to Harvard and Brandeis early on. The Engineers fought back with a close win against BC. The event was highlighted by the performances of Sheel Patel ’20 (6–1 record, epee) and Tzer Wong ’18 (6–3 record, sabre). Patel and Wong joined teammates Nyle Sykes ’21 and Joshua Talbot ’21 on the Northeast Fencing Conference (NFC) all-star team. Wong became the third Engineer in history to be named a sabre all-star four times, thanks to his 25–3 performance in the NFC.

Men’s Tennis (1–1) started the season by splitting a double-header against Boston University and Merrimack College at home. Their matchup against BU was hard-fought. They performed well on doubles but were outperformed on singles, resulting to a 4–3 overall loss. The Engineers, however, dominated Merrimack. In the only doubles matchup, Merrimack won but the opposition had no answer to the Engineers’ singles players, as Sean Ko ’19, Albert Go ’20, and Pablo Ampudia ’21 cruised to wins to sweep the singles and earn the 3–1 overall win.

Men’s Track and Field placed second at the New England Division III Indoor Championship. Twenty-one All-New England performers were involved in the victorious performance as the Engineers were short of just Tufts University.

Men’s Volleyball (9–2, 2–2 NEWMAC) has had an adventurous time lately. After edging out St. John Fisher College in a nailbiter 3–2, they were nudged around by Stevens Institute of Technology as they fell in straight sets. However, the Engineers recovered immediately to sweep New York University. The dominant rebound performance marked the first time the Engineers have defeated NYU since 2014.