The season might be months old for the Penn State fencing team, but this weekend's competition is only the second team event that the Nittany Lions have had and the first since early December. The event takes place on Jan. 28 and is being hosted by the team in the White Building.

The field for this weekend's match includes a number of strong teams, the best of which are St. John's, Penn and Columbia. Columbia will be the strongest team the Lions will compete against this weekend. Other teams include Duke and Drew.

During the competition, the men will fence in five matches and the women will fight in six matches.

Penn State fencing head coach Emmanuil Kaidanov is not making any predictions about the outcome of the matches this weekend until he sees which players show up for the schools.

"Everything depends on what kind of team they will bring. Some of their team members might not come due to World Cup qualifying rounds next weekend," Kaidanov said. He added that no Lions will be missing this weekend, but some members of the team will miss next weekend's match at Brandeis in Boston due to the World Cup, most notably freshman Caitlin Thompson, the women's standout in the saber weapon.

The first NCAA rankings came out ranking the women second behind Notre Dame and the men third behind Ohio State and Notre Dame, respectively.

Kaidanov was not disappointed or pleased with the rankings.

"It's nice, but it is the opinion of those people who take the poll," Kaidanov said. He added that even though the men lost to Harvard in December, they are still ranked ahead of the Ivy League school. He also feels that the women's side is really an open field, but is fine with Notre Dame being ranked ahead of the Lions.

The team hopes to show why it deserves such a high ranking with a strong performance not only this weekend, but also next weekend as well, as it continues towards the NCAA Championship in March.