Millburn fencing coach lunges from Rutgers to NJIT
Millburn resident Yefim Litvan will take over as head of the New Jersey Institute of Technology's varsity fencing program. Photo courtesy New Jersey Institute of Technology
No one would have thought ill of Yefim Litvan, the 67-year-old head coach of the perennially successful Rutgers University fencing program, if he had decided to retire after the school moved to eliminate the sport after the end of the season.
During his 13 years at Rutgers, Litvan's teams appeared in 11 NCAA championships; most recently, he led the team to a 12th-place finish. And the United States Fencing Association named him 2007 Coach of the Year. His reputation was firmly set.
"I don't feel I'm ready for retirement," he told NJ Jewish News in a telephone interview. "I still feel I can give more to kids what I have in my head. I still can teach, and I'd love to continue."
So the Ukrainian emigre has accepted a new challenge. Beginning with the next academic season, Litvan will take charge of the men's and women's fencing teams at the New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark.
He has his work cut out for him: Last season, the NJIT men's team lost 15 of 16 competitions matches, while the women's team lost all 10 meets.
"I hope next year it will be a little bit better," said Litvan, who lives in Millburn.
Litvan began his coaching career as a 19-year-old in 1954 in Ukraine. More than 20 of his proteges achieved the rank of Master of Sports in the former Soviet Union.
He arrived in the United States in 1988 in the wave of Soviet Jewish immigration made possible by glasnost and perestroika. He became an assistant coach at the University of Pennsylvania in 1990 and was named head coach at Rutgers in June 1994.
He compared the amateur sporting cultures in his new and former homes. Young athletes tend to give up their sport earlier in the United States in order to pursue professional careers, he said, citing two of his athletes who decided to quit fencing to concentrate on their studies.
"In the Soviet Union, [sports] was one of the few chances for kids to succeed," he said. "They got a lot of benefits in their life, for their future. Here, it's different. Here is mostly smart kids. They go to good college, get good education, and they can succeed in their life. Over there, even if you go to college and become an engineer or doctor, you still cannot make great living. But it doesn't help you to succeed too much."
Student athletes in the United States, he said, "don't want to sacrifice half of their life for sport, because they can lose a lot of money in their profession. It's difficult to keep guys more than two or three Olympic cycles."
In addition to his college and national team work, Litvan has coached at the New York Athletic Club since 1995. He worked with three fencers who together have competed in five Olympic Games and won six U.S. national championships.
He said NJIT's proximity to Manhattan might be an advantage, giving his athletes an opportunity for additional practice with top fencers in New York, which Litvan described as "the capital of fencing."
Litvan said he wasn't shocked when Rutgers announced last summer that it would cut the fencing program, along with four other varsity sports, in an effort to save money. Critics of the move suggested that athletes like 2003 NCAA national saber champion Alexis Jemal would not have chosen to attend Rutgers if it did not have a fencing team.
"They don't care about results," he said. "They just found a reason to do it."
The NJIT men's fencing program dates back more than 60 years. A separate women's program was founded in 1982-83 and competed until 1990-91, returning as a varsity sport for the 2003-04 season.
Starting in 2007-08, NJIT will be the only public institution in New Jersey to have fencing as an intercollegiate varsity sport, as well as the only school in the state to offer fencing scholarships for both the men's and women's teams. Litvan believes his reputation as a winning coach will help attract student athletes to the school.
"They know my reputation; they know what I can offer them."
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