From the Chairman

[Update: Holly and her 2008 NCAA Fencing Champion coaches and teammates will have lunch with President George Bush at The White House on Tuesday, June 24, 2008 to honor their great achievement... pictures to come!]

Listen to a recording of the President's 24 June 2008 speech to the Champions (MP3).

Read President Bush's 24 June 2008 speech to the NCAA Champions (PDF).

View a larger version of the White House's picture.

View the White House's website of the 24 June 2008 NCAA Champions event.

Columbus, Ohio (March 16, 2008) - Our Holly McKibben, women's foil (center of the OhioStateBuckeyes.com team photo above with a white towel around her neck), joined with the rest of her team to accept the 2008 NCAA Fencing National Championship trophy at St. John's Arena on the campus of The Ohio State University where, as fate would have it, the NCAA had chosen years earlier to hold the championships. Nancy and I were there, along with Holly's younger sister Rose, a foil fencer herself, as well as many friends, fans and supporters to enjoy the moment. (Justin, our 13-year old son, was with friends, cheering from afar, wearing the official 2008 NCAA Fencing Championship tee shirt).

It was an exciting, well-run championship. Some veterans said one of the most well-organized NCAA Fencing Championships to date. Ohio State and Notre Dame dueled neck and neck throughout the 4-day event. On Sunday, however, the day belonged to the Buckeyes as Holly's teammates stepped up amidst the sometimes riotous cheering of past and present teammates, as well as the hundreds of local fencing enthusiasts who attended to cheer on their own. Other teams in the competition included Holly's brother Max's alma mater, Harvard, as well as Penn, Columbia, Brown, Princeton and Yale from the Ivy League, Stanford, Duke, St. John's, Wayne State, and Penn State, among them. Here's a link to the official Ohio State Fencing website.

Holly and the rest of her Ohio State teammates who were not competing provided plenty of spirit, including innumerable "OH's" followed by "IO's". One of the highlights of the weekend was to watch two of our coaches (former top Soviet, World and Olympic fencers), Head Coach Vladimir Nazlymov, and Foil Coach Gia Abashidze, lead the "OH-IO" cheers! Was this a sign that they were now bleeding Scarlet and Gray too?! They made all us Ohioan's proud, showed our children how sacrifice, dedication and hard work can make you the best at something, and they brought home the NCAA Fencing National Championship to Ohio State, once again! More

Epilogue: The coaches invited the parents, team alums (numerous former National Champions among them), OSU organizers and NCAA officials for a party afterwards at Wendell's Alumni Grille across from St. John's Arena. Nancy and I had the pleasure to sit and talk with the two NCAA Armorers for the event (the guys who kept the scoring machines working and the weapons and equipment checked) as well as several of the Directors (fencing name for umpires). We also sat with one of the two surviving members of the 1942 Ohio State Fencing National Champion team, Dr. Ivan Gilbert, who just recently retired from a company he founded, American Health, and lives in Bexley. He is a fascinating gentleman. Coach Vladimir asked Dr. Gilbert (email: igilbert@ahhinc.com) to give a toast in which he praised the team's discipline and spirit.

-- Mike & Nancy McKibben, proud OSU parents and alums

(Holly's late grandpa Jerry Hoovler, an avid Buckeye alum, is smiling in heaven too, we're sure.)

P.S. There's more on Holly's fencing on the "Next Page" of this blog.

Click here for the full team picture above.