Katie Kowalski has a spiffy new pair of sneakers and the women's fencing team is ready to fight for the national championships. Today the Lady Lions board a plane for South Bend, Ind., for five days of competition at the NCAA Championships to be held March 24-28 at Notre Dame.

The Lady Lions (16-0-1) will compete for the No. 1 spot as a foil squad and will combine with the men in competition for the national team champion. When all is said and done, the Penn State fencers could be the No. 1 fencing team in the nation.

"I honestly think the women's team can win the NCAAs," captain Lisa Posthumus said. "If we fence like we fenced all year, we'll finish in the top three. If we fence at our best potential, we're going to win."

The Lady Lions posted a 16 win season with only one loss to Temple, which was technically a tie. Temple, Notre Dame, and Wayne State will join Penn State as the top contenders for the championship. Penn State is seeded fourth.

Posthumus, Kowalski, Jennifer Carcich, Suzie Paxton and Janet Rossman will fence for the Lady Lions. Freshman Carcich and sophomore Paxton are new to the national competition and will follow the lead of their teammates.

"I wonder what it's going to be like," Carcich said. "It's going to be tough since it's so far away and we won't have friends and family cheering us on."

Carcich will also join Posthumus, Kowalski and Rossman in the individual competition. They qualified for the individual tournament in the Mid-Atlantic South Regionals earlier this month.

However, the team competition seems to be more important to the fencers.

"Everyone's a little nervous but everyone's determined to do well," Posthumus said. "This is when the whole season comes to its peak -- it's a chance for the world to see what you're going to do."

In last year's competition the women finished sixth, losing to Notre Dame, Wayne State and Temple. The Lady Lions don't expect the same results this year.

"The last two weeks we've been training to win," Kowalski said. "We'll be ready."

"The women's team has a very close unity and very strong individual performers," Coach Emmanuil Kaidanov said. "We are going to face very tough competition."

During yesterday's practice, emotions varied. Kowalski was showing off her new shoes as Kaidanov rushed her to start practicing. Carcich joked around with teammates and Posthumus wasn't able to make it to practice because of a review session conflict.

The fencers will miss four days of classes and some will miss exams. They aren't too worried about the missed work, though.

"I'll be missing one test, but I have to come back to three," Carcich said. "(But) we've all been encouraging of each other since we were all stressed this week trying to get ahead."