When senior fencer Jeremy Kahn returned to campus last spring after the NCAA Tournament in New Haven, CT, a teammate asked him how he had done. Kahn responded that he did 'pretty well,' neglecting to mention that he had become the national champion, winning the epee competition.
At a school where a Final Four appearance in the NCAA basketball Tournament would mean unbridled celebration, thousands of dollars in tee shirt sales and bench burning late into the night, Kahn walks the campus unnoticed.
After finishing with a 21-14 record during the regular season his junior year, Kahn was selected for the NCAA Tournament.
"I was probably an underdog," Kahn said. "My original goal in the tournament was to make the Top 12, which was All-American."
Going into the second round with the highest point total, he changed his goal to top four, and then top two. He ended up in the top spot, beating a fencer who had consistently beaten him in other matches.
"I never really thought I would win until afterward," he said.
Kahn's victory in the tournament also impacted the rest of Duke's fencing team.
"When he told me he won it was the most exciting fencing moment I've ever had," sophomore teammate Brian Hartman said. "It completely inspired me."
Kahn did not begin to fence until his freshman year at Montclair Kimberley Academy in N.J., when members of the team asked if anybody wanted to learn. The 6-foot-5 Kahn joined the team fencing with an epee sword, as opposed to the other saber and foil swords.
"My high school coach took one look at me and said 'epee,'" Kahn said. "To fence epee, it's best to be tall and skinny, which I am. If you're taller, you have a better chance of hitting."
Although he played other sports, Kahn narrowed down his focus to fencing.
"It's a combination of an individual sport and a team sport," Kahn said. "A lot of people say that fencing is chess at the speed of boxing, and it really is."
In addition to his stellar individual performances, Kahn has been a key member of the Duke team as well, leading the team both on and off the strip and accepting the pressure of being the team's top fencer. Among his biggest wins as a Blue Devil was in a home meet against Brandeis last season, when, with the team match tied 13-13, he took the deciding bout to give Duke the match.
"I like being in the pressure situations," Kahn said. "I like to be in the last bout and have the meet come down to me."
After starting to take lessons outside of high school his sophomore year, and becoming team captain his junior and senior years, Kahn began to compete nationally. He finished sixth in the 1993 Junior Cadet Circuit and eighth in the 1993 Junior Olympics.
He came to Duke after being recruited for fencing and joined a team with seven other freshmen who started. After a freshman year where he fenced "not as well as I'd hoped," finishing 9-13, he compiled a winning record sophomore year, with a 25-15 record. At the end of his sophomore campaign, Kahn made his first NCAA Tournament appearance, and finished 18th.
In practice, Kahn became a model for his teammates.
"Every action I have in my book is from Jeremy," Hartman, also an epee fencer, said. "Having someone like him to fence with every day is amazing."
Kahn brings the same type of intensity to practice that he did to the NCAA Tournament, and this intensity is contagious.
"Watching him take a lesson is incredible," Hartman said. "You have the feeling practicing with him that you can't ever let up."
As intense as Kahn is on the fencing strip, what really impresses his Duke teammates, however, is his laid-back personality outside of competition.
"Even as much as [winning NCAA's] meant to him, it was so low-key," Hartman said.
Kahn describes himself as "easy-going" and optimistic.
"I don't get caught up in many things," he said. "I always know that everything will work out."
With that optimism in tow, Kahn is looking toward his next goal, qualifying for the Sydney Olympics in 2000.
"Hopefully it's not too much of a stretch," he said. "Looking at other athletes who have done well in NCAAs, many are at that level."
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