The following feature first appeared in the football game program on Sept. 15, 2018.

Once upon a time long ago …

Sound like the beginning of a fairy tale?  It should, because that's exactly what it is – with one big exception.  It's not make-believe. It's real – as real as the souvenir program you're holding, the moon, the sun and the stars.

But you still might have a hard time believing it, because it does not seem, real, or possible.

Think of it this way: Wayne State was once like Hickory High School in the famous movie, "Hoosiers," only what the Warriors did was not just one shot heard 'round the world, but a bunch of shots –a bunch bigger than you can imagine.

At about the same time that the UCLA was dominating basketball, WSU was dominating another men's college sport – not in the smaller Division II, where the school has long resided, but with all the big schools in Division I since everybody is grouped in one class.

Wayne State has a rich sports tradition, with nearly every program having done something very special. And if the measuring stick is national prominence, then the most special of those programs is men's fencing.

Indeed, at a school with a lot of really cool sports stories, this might well be the coolest.

What we do know for sure, though, is that it's literally off the charts.

In an 11-year span from 1975-85, the Warriors won seven – yes, that's right, seven, as in one more than six and one less than eight! – NCAA Division I championships, six of which came in a seven-year stretch in 1979, '80, '82, '83, '84 and '85. The first one was in 1975.

UCLA became arguably the greatest story – the greatest dynasty – in the history of men's college basketball with 10 titles in 12 years from 1964-75, so then, does that mean that Wayne State 30-40 years ago is arguably the greatest story – the greatest dynasty – in men's fencing?

Let's take this beyond the WSU campus boundaries. Detroit is a city that has some of the greatest athletes of all time in a variety of sports, such as Ty Cobb in baseball, Gordie Howe (hockey), Joe Louis (boxing), Barry Sanders (football) and enough great basketball players, including George Gervin, Dave Bing and Dave DeBusschere, to fill up several teams. All of those men have been put up onto pedestals, and rightfully so, for they are truly special.

Though they've certainly flown under the radar because the sport isn't as high-profile, those fencers – Greg Benko (two in foil), Yuri Rabinovich (two, sabre), Ernest Simon (three, foil), Gil Pezza (two, epee), Neil Hick (sabre), Ettore Bianchi (two, epee) and Stephan Chauvel (foil), all of whom won individual national championships during those team title years – deserve some pedestals of their own, with unique accolades and praise sent their way. The term "iconic" needs a broader context, and swath, and WSU fencing has to be part of it.

Just as the greats Cobb, Howe, Louis, and all the rest, may never be duplicated, the same could be said for the WSU fencers.

"We were the dominant program in fencing that time. We ruled the whole country. It was really something," said the 63-year old Pezza, a native of Italy and now a retired attorney in the Detroit area who is a WSU Sports Hall of Fame inductee.

"This doesn't really happen in fencing, but it did at Wayne State at the time, because if you were a fencer then, you had a very distinguished place on campus. Everybody knew the success we were having, and they knew us as individuals. We got all kinds of proclamations from the state legislators in Lansing for our accomplishments. We also were in demand to give fencing demonstrations all around the area. If there was a bar mitzvah, we might be getting a call to show up. People wanted to see what fencing was, what it was all about. It was a lot of fun."

Fencing success at Wayne State, despite the fact it is obviously headlined by what happened from 1975-85, certainly isn't defined totally by that meteoric run. The history of the sport goes back a long way. In fact, the first seeds for fencing excellence were planted decades before, in the first full year of World War II in 1942, when Byron Kreiger (foil) captured the school's first individual national title. It continued with Bruce Davis, the national champ in foil in 1957 and '58, Bela Szentivanyi (sabre, 1963) and Steve Danosi (sabre, 1974).

Team-wise, those seeds were first planted in 1947 when WSU placed nationally for first time by finishing ninth. The Tartars, as they were called then, were seventh in 1948 and ninth again in 1951, all under head coach Bela de Tuscan.

Then in the 17-year span from 1958-74, head coach Istvan Danosi's team placed in the top-10 nationally 11 times, including earning a second, two at third place, a fourth, a fifth, three at sixth place, a seventh and two at eighth place.

Danosi was still the coach in 1975 when WSU finally broke through and claimed its first national title, and also was there for three more in 1979, '80 and '82.

"He was one of the key men who built the foundation of fencing at Wayne State," Pezza said. "He was from Hungary and came here after the Russian invasion in 1956. He really knew the sport, and because of his heritage, he could recruit internationally.  "He had quite a command, quite a presence. He was like an army general. He was known as 'The Maestro.' "

USA Fencing Hall of Famer Aladar Kogler was coach for one year, in 1983, and won the national title, then former fencer Pezza took over and guided WSU to the titles in 1984 and '85, giving the school four consecutive crowns.

In between all those championships were second-place finishes in 1976 and '81, and a third-place finish in both 1977 and '78.  In the 15 seasons from 1971-85, WSU placed each time, including never lower than third in the final 13 of those years.

Pezza's teams were sixth in 1986 and seventh in '89, after which the NCAA combined men's and women's fencing into one team trophy.  That made for quite a squad, because the WSU women, which earned three Division I national titles in 1982, '88 and '89.

Fencing accounts for 10 of the 11 national championships captured by Wayne State teams. The only other one came in 2012 in Division II women's swimming and diving.

Pezza took over and coached the combined team to fifth nationally in 1990 and ninth in '91, after which Jerzy Radz became coach. Radz has coached it ever since, with his teams placing nationally 26 seasons in a row.

So, with that success, then, to say that WSU is, in essence a fencing school in the big picture historically, is entirely accurate.

But, not surprisingly, it is what took place with those seven national champions won by the men that still draws the most notice, even all these years later.

Part of what made those Wayne State teams so good was the fact that even the backup fencers were good.  "The second fencers at Wayne State would have been No. 1 everywhere else," Pezza said. "That's how you built a team back then, with lots of depth.

That depth included some local products such as Detroit Pershing High School product Michael Davis, and Jon Zelkowski, an alum of the former Southfield-Lathrup High School. Both were athletic and played other sports before being turned on to fencing in high school.

"Our greatest competitions were against ourselves," said Davis, now 62 and living in San Antonio, where he just retired after working 34 years as a high school athletic coordinator there. "Only one guy in each event could go to the nationals, but those guys got very well-prepared by the people he faced in practice every day. We knew that if we just worked hard, we wouldn't lose. We would win the national championship."

Zelkowski, 58, works in office technology and coaches fencing in Livonia with Pezza, his former WSU teammate.  "We were just that good. We really were," he said. "We kicked everybody's backsides."

A lot of time has passed since then. The years, now having turned into decades, have helped crystallize for the former WSU fencers just how special that period was.

"It didn't dawn on me until much, much later what we accomplished," Davis said. "We were very strong and very talented."

And very unforgettable.