For the first time in a decade, a Stanford Cardinal fencer is the NCAA champion. Her coach, four-time Olympian Alexander Massialas, was the last person to win that title at the university.
Massialas, Olympic silver and bronze medalist, said he's exceeded his expectations in his first coaching season.
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WATCH HERE"The first person to congratulate her was the last person to win it himself," he said.
In March, Cardinal sophomore Arianna Cao won the NCAA Championship. Massialas was the last person to win that title at Stanford in 2015.
"We just trust the process," Massialas said. "We really put pride in our preparation, and then results are just the results. We can't control that. But we will always be able to take pride in the way we prepare for these moments."
Cao said she didn't have any expectations for herself.
"Last year I didn't do that well," she said. "It was like 19th out of 24. So my goal this year was just to be slightly better than 19th. I guess I did that... the goal is just to keep working at it – be a better fencer than I was the day before."
Massialas and Cao met before Stanford. In fact, she trained as a kid at the "M-Team Fencing Club" in San Francisco. The club is founded by Team USA men's fencing coach Greg Massialas, who is also Alexander's father.
"Part of my role at the club is to fence with and mentor the younger kids," Alexander said.
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SIGN UP But Alexander didn't think that mentor role would turn into a head coaching job. He said after the Paris Olympics he was going to look for a job in mechanical engineering. He offered to help the fencing team find a new coach, but after a lot of thought he figured that he was a good fit and applied for the job.
"No one knows Stanford fencing like I do," Alexander said.
What about LA 2028? Alexander is now juggling his own competitions and training. He said its improved his training being around a group of younger fencers and adding their skills to his training repertoire.
"I can't say that there were that many other people who looked me before me," Alexander said. "Now you look at the podium and you even look at the top eight for the women's foil event that Ariana won. There's so much Asian American representation up there and it just goes to show that we can be really successful in whatever we wanna do, whatever we want to pursue."
