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Thursday, May 1, 2025
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2025 All-ACC Academic Men’s Fencing Team
2025 All-ACC Academic Women’s Fencing Team
Wood, Candescu, Tong Lead 2024-25 All-ACC Fencing Academic Team
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (theACC.com) – North Carolina’s Elden Wood has been named the 2024-25 Atlantic Coast Conference Men’s Fencing Scholar-Athlete of the Year, while Duke’s Kunling Tong and Notre Dame’s Rebeca Candescu shared the 2024-25 ACC Women's Fencing Scholar-Athlete of the Year honor. The trio leads the 2024-25 All-ACC Academic Fencing Teams, which were announced Thursday.
This year’s ACC Men’s and Women’s All-ACC Fencing Academic Teams feature 14 All-All-America honorees from the 2025 NCAA Championships, with seven men and seven women, including national champions Chase Emmer (men’s foil) and Magda Skarbonkiewicz (women’s sabre) from Notre Dame and Arianna Cao (women’s foil) from Stanford.
Wood earned Honorable Mention All-America honors at the 2025 NCAA Championships with his 11th-place finish in sabre. Majoring in psychology, the junior from New York, New York has been named to the All-ACC Academic Team three times in his career and also has been named to the ACC Academic Honor Roll, UNC Dean’s List and Tar Heel Scholar-Athlete.
Candescu earned Scholar-Athlete of the Year honors for the second straight year. A senior from Metuchen, New Jersey, she helped lead the Fighting Irish to both the 2025 ACC and NCAA championships. Candescu earned the 2025 ACC individual championship in women’s foil. Majoring in neuroscience and behavior, she has been named to the All-ACC Academic Team and ACC Academic Honor Roll three times previously.
Tong was the ACC runner-up in sabre at the 2025 ACC Championships. A junior from Marietta, Georgia, she turned in a 22-9 regular-season ledger and guided the Duke sabre squad to a 23-4 regular-season while earning Honorable Mention All-Region laurels. A computer science major, she boasts a perfect 4.0 career GPA and is now a three-time All-ACC Academic Team honoree.
Duke led all schools with 17 honorees on the men’s team and 16 on the women’s team. Notre Dame had 16 recipients on the men’s team and 14 on the women’s team.
Academic requirements for selection to the All-ACC Academic Team are a 3.0-grade point average for the previous semester and a 3.0 cumulative average during one’s academic career. In addition, student-athletes must compete in either the ACC Championship or NCAA Championship this season in the sport of fencing.
Please see the link below for the complete listing of the 2024-25 All-ACC Academic Fencing Teams, including each student-athlete’s major of study.
2025 All-ACC Academic Men’s Fencing Team
2025 All-ACC Academic Women’s Fencing Team