What also irks me about this is that if memory serves, Forood doesn't coach her players for the individual part of the tournament, unlike many other team coaches. And we almost always fare much worse in the individual portion than the team portion, which would seem to indicate that her coaching makes a difference. Yes, a deep team run almost every year will also mean we're often out of gas for the individual and doubles tournaments, but I do think the difference in outcome is so striking as to suggest it's not just the raw inputs she's acquiring that turn into trophies but also how she molds them.
NCAA Championship Women's Tennis: National Champions!!!
What also irks me about this is that if memory serves, Forood doesn't coach her players for the individual part of the tournament, unlike many other team coaches. And we almost always fare much worse in the individual portion than the team portion, which would seem to indicate that her coaching makes a difference. Yes, a deep team run almost every year will also mean we're often out of gas for the individual and doubles tournaments, but I do think the difference in outcome is so striking as to suggest it's not just the raw inputs she's acquiring that turn into trophies but also how she molds them.
05-20-2019, 04:47 PM
(05-20-2019, 03:16 PM)2006alum Wrote: What also irks me about this is that if memory serves, Forood doesn't coach her players for the individual part of the tournament, unlike many other team coaches. And we almost always fare much worse in the individual portion than the team portion, which would seem to indicate that her coaching makes a difference. Yes, a deep team run almost every year will also mean we're often out of gas for the individual and doubles tournaments, but I do think the difference in outcome is so striking as to suggest it's not just the raw inputs she's acquiring that turn into trophies but also how she molds them.
As you know, Stanford now has 20 team national titles in women's tennis. Here's the list of individual titles:
Nicole Gibbs x2 (2012, 2013)
Amber Lieu x2 (2003, 2004)
Laura Granville x2 (2000, 2001)
Lilia Osterloh (1997)
Sandra Birch x2 (1989, 1991)
Debbie Graham (1990)
Patty Fendick x2 (1986, 1987)
Alycia Moulton (1982)
So 13 individual titles to 20 team titles (also 8 doubles titles). By the way, we've had a player win the individual title 3 times in years when we didn't win the team title, whereas we've won the team title 9 times without the individual title winner, with this year's individual title winner TBD.
BC
(05-20-2019, 03:16 PM)2006alum Wrote: What also irks me about this is that if memory serves, Forood doesn't coach her players for the individual part of the tournament, unlike many other team coaches. And we almost always fare much worse in the individual portion than the team portion, which would seem to indicate that her coaching makes a difference. Yes, a deep team run almost every year will also mean we're often out of gas for the individual and doubles tournaments, but I do think the difference in outcome is so striking as to suggest it's not just the raw inputs she's acquiring that turn into trophies but also how she molds them.
As you know, Stanford now has 20 team national titles in women's tennis. Here's the list of individual titles:
Nicole Gibbs x2 (2012, 2013)
Amber Lieu x2 (2003, 2004)
Laura Granville x2 (2000, 2001)
Lilia Osterloh (1997)
Sandra Birch x2 (1989, 1991)
Debbie Graham (1990)
Patty Fendick x2 (1986, 1987)
Alycia Moulton (1982)
So 13 individual titles to 20 team titles (also 8 doubles titles). By the way, we've had a player win the individual title 3 times in years when we didn't win the team title, whereas we've won the team title 9 times without the individual title winner, with this year's individual title winner TBD.
BC
A few comments --
Depth, of course, is a big factor in the NCAA tournament. It's a major advantage to have 6 high-level players. But how many teams can go 9 deep, as Stanford did in this tournament? Now that's some real depth. It's just crazy that Stanford can put Sara Choy in the singles line-up against the #1 ranked team in the nation in the tournament semifinal, with Choy not having played for 7 weeks, and have her deliver a win!
The #2 doubles was pivotal against Georgia, IMO. Stanford was an underdog in 4 of the 6 singles matches (according to UTR). The more singles upsets we needed, the longer the odds would have been. Winning the doubles point made our disadvantage in singles more manageable. After the teams split the #1 and #3 doubles, Gordon and Arbuthnott came through in a tight match at #2. That was really big.
The singles seemed to me to be about as drama-free as an NCAA final can be. Lord, Lampl, and Shin pretty quickly took the lead, won three quick first sets, then got through the three second sets in good order. There was never much cause for real worry in those three matches. No need for any nail-biting third sets. No need for everything to come down to one player. That was nice.
Congrats to the entire team and the coaches. Well done.
Depth, of course, is a big factor in the NCAA tournament. It's a major advantage to have 6 high-level players. But how many teams can go 9 deep, as Stanford did in this tournament? Now that's some real depth. It's just crazy that Stanford can put Sara Choy in the singles line-up against the #1 ranked team in the nation in the tournament semifinal, with Choy not having played for 7 weeks, and have her deliver a win!
The #2 doubles was pivotal against Georgia, IMO. Stanford was an underdog in 4 of the 6 singles matches (according to UTR). The more singles upsets we needed, the longer the odds would have been. Winning the doubles point made our disadvantage in singles more manageable. After the teams split the #1 and #3 doubles, Gordon and Arbuthnott came through in a tight match at #2. That was really big.
The singles seemed to me to be about as drama-free as an NCAA final can be. Lord, Lampl, and Shin pretty quickly took the lead, won three quick first sets, then got through the three second sets in good order. There was never much cause for real worry in those three matches. No need for any nail-biting third sets. No need for everything to come down to one player. That was nice.
Congrats to the entire team and the coaches. Well done.
A few comments --
Depth, of course, is a big factor in the NCAA tournament. It's a major advantage to have 6 high-level players. But how many teams can go 9 deep, as Stanford did in this tournament? Now that's some real depth. It's just crazy that Stanford can put Sara Choy in the singles line-up against the #1 ranked team in the nation in the tournament semifinal, with Choy not having played for 7 weeks, and have her deliver a win!
The #2 doubles was pivotal against Georgia, IMO. Stanford was an underdog in 4 of the 6 singles matches (according to UTR). The more singles upsets we needed, the longer the odds would have been. Winning the doubles point made our disadvantage in singles more manageable. After the teams split the #1 and #3 doubles, Gordon and Arbuthnott came through in a tight match at #2. That was really big.
The singles seemed to me to be about as drama-free as an NCAA final can be. Lord, Lampl, and Shin pretty quickly took the lead, won three quick first sets, then got through the three second sets in good order. There was never much cause for real worry in those three matches. No need for any nail-biting third sets. No need for everything to come down to one player. That was nice.
Congrats to the entire team and the coaches. Well done.
Depth, of course, is a big factor in the NCAA tournament. It's a major advantage to have 6 high-level players. But how many teams can go 9 deep, as Stanford did in this tournament? Now that's some real depth. It's just crazy that Stanford can put Sara Choy in the singles line-up against the #1 ranked team in the nation in the tournament semifinal, with Choy not having played for 7 weeks, and have her deliver a win!
The #2 doubles was pivotal against Georgia, IMO. Stanford was an underdog in 4 of the 6 singles matches (according to UTR). The more singles upsets we needed, the longer the odds would have been. Winning the doubles point made our disadvantage in singles more manageable. After the teams split the #1 and #3 doubles, Gordon and Arbuthnott came through in a tight match at #2. That was really big.
The singles seemed to me to be about as drama-free as an NCAA final can be. Lord, Lampl, and Shin pretty quickly took the lead, won three quick first sets, then got through the three second sets in good order. There was never much cause for real worry in those three matches. No need for any nail-biting third sets. No need for everything to come down to one player. That was nice.
Congrats to the entire team and the coaches. Well done.
(05-20-2019, 08:38 AM)ColoradoTree Wrote: In doubles, you can safely assume Arbuthnott/Gordon will be the #1 pair, but the fall season will be a time for seeing how the rest of the roster plays together and who has chemistry. Your guess on the #2 and #3 pairs is as good as mine, but both Shin and Madurawe have shown themselves to be good doubles players, so I'd expect them to be somewhere in that lineup.
In singles, Gordon is your clear-cut #1 and Arbuthnott your #2, and I assume Shin will play #3, but after that it gets a little murkier. It's hard to know how that'll shake out, but I think we should reasonably have more confidence that they'll be just fine in regular lineup spots next year.
But we lose three big contributors. Not just the on-court talent, but Lord with her clutch gene, and Lampl as the hardest hitter and the heartbeat of the team. Yee may have only played doubles, but she did it well, and her chemistry with her classmate was evident. The team will have to settle into new roles, and new leaders will need to step up.
Losing great players to graduation happens, of course. And Stanford has survived it better than most. In 2016, we won a national championship behind two great seniors, Caroline Doyle and Taylor Davidson (who is another all-time competitor whose passion always seemed like a catalyst for team success). We made it to the NCAA final the very next season, and won it all the year after that.
I'm of course ever-hopeful for next year, but I expect a fine season but not a championship (and hope to be surprised yet again). Lord and Lampl have been instrumental in all three of our recent championships; really the two of them have provided almost half the total points needed to win them (all the key matches, not just the championship matches), including in their freshman year. Without either one of them (say, for illness or injury) we don't win any of those 3 championships. Look at what happened last year when Lord was out for awhile. They have just been tremendous beyond words. They are really impossible to replace. I was so glad to hear them in the press conference rate their overall college experience so highly, they deserve it.
Arbuthnott is going to have to raise her game considerably to be competitive in the big matches at #2 next year. Not saying she can't or won't do it, but it's a high bar she needs to reach. I don't know anything about the incoming players; hopefully they will have a big impact, but they're not going to be Lampl/Lord good for awhile (even Lampl/Lord were not that good the first part of their freshman year, but they got a LOT better by the NCAA tournament). We'll need to be very strong at the bottom of the lineup (as usual). One additional thing we're losing in Lord and Lampl is our only players with an effective first serve (i.e., can often win points off the first serve); I hope Gordon continues to work on hers because she certainly is capable of having one.
But it'll be a new year and hope springs eternal?
(05-20-2019, 08:38 AM)ColoradoTree Wrote: In doubles, you can safely assume Arbuthnott/Gordon will be the #1 pair, but the fall season will be a time for seeing how the rest of the roster plays together and who has chemistry. Your guess on the #2 and #3 pairs is as good as mine, but both Shin and Madurawe have shown themselves to be good doubles players, so I'd expect them to be somewhere in that lineup.
In singles, Gordon is your clear-cut #1 and Arbuthnott your #2, and I assume Shin will play #3, but after that it gets a little murkier. It's hard to know how that'll shake out, but I think we should reasonably have more confidence that they'll be just fine in regular lineup spots next year.
But we lose three big contributors. Not just the on-court talent, but Lord with her clutch gene, and Lampl as the hardest hitter and the heartbeat of the team. Yee may have only played doubles, but she did it well, and her chemistry with her classmate was evident. The team will have to settle into new roles, and new leaders will need to step up.
Losing great players to graduation happens, of course. And Stanford has survived it better than most. In 2016, we won a national championship behind two great seniors, Caroline Doyle and Taylor Davidson (who is another all-time competitor whose passion always seemed like a catalyst for team success). We made it to the NCAA final the very next season, and won it all the year after that.
I'm of course ever-hopeful for next year, but I expect a fine season but not a championship (and hope to be surprised yet again). Lord and Lampl have been instrumental in all three of our recent championships; really the two of them have provided almost half the total points needed to win them (all the key matches, not just the championship matches), including in their freshman year. Without either one of them (say, for illness or injury) we don't win any of those 3 championships. Look at what happened last year when Lord was out for awhile. They have just been tremendous beyond words. They are really impossible to replace. I was so glad to hear them in the press conference rate their overall college experience so highly, they deserve it.
Arbuthnott is going to have to raise her game considerably to be competitive in the big matches at #2 next year. Not saying she can't or won't do it, but it's a high bar she needs to reach. I don't know anything about the incoming players; hopefully they will have a big impact, but they're not going to be Lampl/Lord good for awhile (even Lampl/Lord were not that good the first part of their freshman year, but they got a LOT better by the NCAA tournament). We'll need to be very strong at the bottom of the lineup (as usual). One additional thing we're losing in Lord and Lampl is our only players with an effective first serve (i.e., can often win points off the first serve); I hope Gordon continues to work on hers because she certainly is capable of having one.
But it'll be a new year and hope springs eternal?
05-21-2019, 07:52 AM
(This post was last modified: 05-21-2019, 09:51 AM by ColoradoTree.)
(05-20-2019, 03:16 PM)2006alum Wrote: What also irks me about this is that if memory serves, Forood doesn't coach her players for the individual part of the tournament, unlike many other team coaches. And we almost always fare much worse in the individual portion than the team portion, which would seem to indicate that her coaching makes a difference. Yes, a deep team run almost every year will also mean we're often out of gas for the individual and doubles tournaments, but I do think the difference in outcome is so striking as to suggest it's not just the raw inputs she's acquiring that turn into trophies but also how she molds them.
I recall the same thing you do about past individual tournaments (or at least the ones where I live streamed some of it, where I didn't see Lele out there at all, even in key points where our players were in a tailspin), but when I was watching the end of Lord's first set yesterday, I saw her talk to Lele, and then Lele went over one court to talk to Gordon, who was just getting started, I believe.
So, she was present, but I don't know how much in-match coaching went on. Even during the regular season, she's not as intense an in-game coach as many others are, and I see Frankie do a lot of the in-match stuff, too (I also saw Frankie talk to Lord at one point during that match).
I could be completely off base here, but my impression is that Lele tries to build players who are sufficiently mentally tough that they don't need a lot of in-match pick-me-ups. "We're all here for you, we're going to cheer for you, and I'll come check in from time to time, too, but I'm not going to talk to you on every changeover. You're an adult, and you can handle your business." But I'm making a lot of assumptions there. But it feels right.
(This post was last modified: 05-21-2019, 09:51 AM by ColoradoTree.)
(05-20-2019, 03:16 PM)2006alum Wrote: What also irks me about this is that if memory serves, Forood doesn't coach her players for the individual part of the tournament, unlike many other team coaches. And we almost always fare much worse in the individual portion than the team portion, which would seem to indicate that her coaching makes a difference. Yes, a deep team run almost every year will also mean we're often out of gas for the individual and doubles tournaments, but I do think the difference in outcome is so striking as to suggest it's not just the raw inputs she's acquiring that turn into trophies but also how she molds them.
I recall the same thing you do about past individual tournaments (or at least the ones where I live streamed some of it, where I didn't see Lele out there at all, even in key points where our players were in a tailspin), but when I was watching the end of Lord's first set yesterday, I saw her talk to Lele, and then Lele went over one court to talk to Gordon, who was just getting started, I believe.
So, she was present, but I don't know how much in-match coaching went on. Even during the regular season, she's not as intense an in-game coach as many others are, and I see Frankie do a lot of the in-match stuff, too (I also saw Frankie talk to Lord at one point during that match).
I could be completely off base here, but my impression is that Lele tries to build players who are sufficiently mentally tough that they don't need a lot of in-match pick-me-ups. "We're all here for you, we're going to cheer for you, and I'll come check in from time to time, too, but I'm not going to talk to you on every changeover. You're an adult, and you can handle your business." But I'm making a lot of assumptions there. But it feels right.
05-21-2019, 07:57 AM
I’m a firm believer to coach during practice not during the game. In basketball so many stand and yell non stop.
05-21-2019, 09:33 AM
(This post was last modified: 05-21-2019, 09:48 AM by ColoradoTree.)
(05-20-2019, 06:25 PM)terry Wrote: The singles seemed to me to be about as drama-free as an NCAA final can be. Lord, Lampl, and Shin pretty quickly took the lead, won three quick first sets, then got through the three second sets in good order. There was never much cause for real worry in those three matches. No need for any nail-biting third sets. No need for everything to come down to one player. That was nice.
It felt almost anticlimactic to win a national championship that way! But the thing I'm proudest of is that Stanford did shut the door. You can't let a team that good start to feel hopeful, and Lord, Lampl, and Shin all finished strong.
Easy to imagine what happens next if Shin tightens up serving for a championships, gets broken, and it's 5-5. Christofi then holds to 5-6 and Shin is serving to force a tiebreaker where all of a sudden the momentum shifted Georgia's way. Jokic wins the deuce point she was about to serve and now she leads Gordon 7-5, 4-2. Wolff wins her service game to go up 7-5, 4-3. Higuchi had won her first set but was down a break in the second. If Georgia goes on a bit of a run, it's not hard to imagine Gordon and Arbuthnott losing, and Stanford leading 3-2 with both Shin and Higuchi headed to third sets.
4-0 looks like a beatdown, but if Shin had let up in that last game, it could have ended very differently. You can't let up for a second, and we didn't.
So, we lose Lord (20-1 in NCAA team play) and Lampl (15-3). Here are the NCAA team competition records for our returning players:
Gordon (2-3)
Arbuthnott (10-3)
Shin (8-0)
Higuchi (9-1)
Choy (1-0)
Madurawe (1-1)
Not quite the same, I know. But boy, we have some talent. Not too many teams keep players of Choy's and Madurawe's caliber out of the singles lineup for a year. Recall that historically, this team has plugged freshmen in at the bottom of the lineup, and they've delivered. In 2016, Lampl and Lord were massive at #5 and #6 for us, both making the All-Tournament team. In 2017, Higuchi was a force at #6 (she didn't lose there until the NCAA final), and Arbuthnott made the All-Tournament team at #5 singles. In 2018, yet another freshman made the All-Tournament team at #5 (Shin), and the only reason we didn't have the other freshman at #6 is because we were playing her at #1. This year, we didn't use our freshmen as much, and not because they weren't good enough to play in big moments (as Choy showed us all)--unlike every other year, we didn't have holes we needed to fill. Next year, we might not play our two blue chip freshmen either.
Our depth is insane.
(This post was last modified: 05-21-2019, 09:48 AM by ColoradoTree.)
(05-20-2019, 06:25 PM)terry Wrote: The singles seemed to me to be about as drama-free as an NCAA final can be. Lord, Lampl, and Shin pretty quickly took the lead, won three quick first sets, then got through the three second sets in good order. There was never much cause for real worry in those three matches. No need for any nail-biting third sets. No need for everything to come down to one player. That was nice.
It felt almost anticlimactic to win a national championship that way! But the thing I'm proudest of is that Stanford did shut the door. You can't let a team that good start to feel hopeful, and Lord, Lampl, and Shin all finished strong.
Easy to imagine what happens next if Shin tightens up serving for a championships, gets broken, and it's 5-5. Christofi then holds to 5-6 and Shin is serving to force a tiebreaker where all of a sudden the momentum shifted Georgia's way. Jokic wins the deuce point she was about to serve and now she leads Gordon 7-5, 4-2. Wolff wins her service game to go up 7-5, 4-3. Higuchi had won her first set but was down a break in the second. If Georgia goes on a bit of a run, it's not hard to imagine Gordon and Arbuthnott losing, and Stanford leading 3-2 with both Shin and Higuchi headed to third sets.
4-0 looks like a beatdown, but if Shin had let up in that last game, it could have ended very differently. You can't let up for a second, and we didn't.
So, we lose Lord (20-1 in NCAA team play) and Lampl (15-3). Here are the NCAA team competition records for our returning players:
Gordon (2-3)
Arbuthnott (10-3)
Shin (8-0)
Higuchi (9-1)
Choy (1-0)
Madurawe (1-1)
Not quite the same, I know. But boy, we have some talent. Not too many teams keep players of Choy's and Madurawe's caliber out of the singles lineup for a year. Recall that historically, this team has plugged freshmen in at the bottom of the lineup, and they've delivered. In 2016, Lampl and Lord were massive at #5 and #6 for us, both making the All-Tournament team. In 2017, Higuchi was a force at #6 (she didn't lose there until the NCAA final), and Arbuthnott made the All-Tournament team at #5 singles. In 2018, yet another freshman made the All-Tournament team at #5 (Shin), and the only reason we didn't have the other freshman at #6 is because we were playing her at #1. This year, we didn't use our freshmen as much, and not because they weren't good enough to play in big moments (as Choy showed us all)--unlike every other year, we didn't have holes we needed to fill. Next year, we might not play our two blue chip freshmen either.
Our depth is insane.
On coaching during matches:
I know when Stanford players have to play each other in a tournament, there is a strict no-coaching rule. I don't remember the coaches being completely absent from NCAA singles play, my impression is they are definitely more restrained about lending advice than they are during team play. Maybe they are trying to encourage more self-reliance when the only thing at stake is their individual success, which is not true during a team match. For me, one of the most enjoyable parts of tennis is the need to continually analyze, especially at changeovers, what's working for you and what's not, what's working for your opponent and how to try to counter it. Makes it more than just thwacking a ball over a net. The most enjoyable wins are when your opponent is equally or more skillful than you at hitting the ball, but you are able to figure out during the match how to play them most effectively.
I really liked the recent pro tournaments when the intra-match coaching visits were televised, it was really interesting and informative to hear what they had to say, which was a mixture of one or two tactical things and some encouragement. It was startling to me, hearing the players talk in those visits, how un-confident some of them were--I always thought of pro players as necessarily supremely confident but I was wrong.
I think the 4-0 final score is a little misleading: had all the matches been played out, it probably would have been 5-2 or 4-3.
I know when Stanford players have to play each other in a tournament, there is a strict no-coaching rule. I don't remember the coaches being completely absent from NCAA singles play, my impression is they are definitely more restrained about lending advice than they are during team play. Maybe they are trying to encourage more self-reliance when the only thing at stake is their individual success, which is not true during a team match. For me, one of the most enjoyable parts of tennis is the need to continually analyze, especially at changeovers, what's working for you and what's not, what's working for your opponent and how to try to counter it. Makes it more than just thwacking a ball over a net. The most enjoyable wins are when your opponent is equally or more skillful than you at hitting the ball, but you are able to figure out during the match how to play them most effectively.
I really liked the recent pro tournaments when the intra-match coaching visits were televised, it was really interesting and informative to hear what they had to say, which was a mixture of one or two tactical things and some encouragement. It was startling to me, hearing the players talk in those visits, how un-confident some of them were--I always thought of pro players as necessarily supremely confident but I was wrong.
(05-20-2019, 06:25 PM)terry Wrote: The singles seemed to me to be about as drama-free as an NCAA final can be. Lord, Lampl, and Shin . . . got through the three second sets in good order. There was never much cause for real worry in those three matches.Probably just my nature, but I felt some drama there toward the end. Lord completely imploded while losing two games toward the end of the second set, and if she had lost that deciding point that won her the match, she easily could have lost that set (I would have expected her to turn it around in the third set, but you never know--she had two 2-set losses against that player in previous matches). Lampl starting making errors when she was close to closing it out, as did Shin. Given that at those times we were losing on two courts, and Higuchi was either getting pulled into a tiebreaker or down a break in the second set to a player that had dominated her in their previous meeting, I was getting a little tense there! Had we not won the doubles point, I would have been even more stressed then.
I think the 4-0 final score is a little misleading: had all the matches been played out, it probably would have been 5-2 or 4-3.
On coaching during matches:
I know when Stanford players have to play each other in a tournament, there is a strict no-coaching rule. I don't remember the coaches being completely absent from NCAA singles play, my impression is they are definitely more restrained about lending advice than they are during team play. Maybe they are trying to encourage more self-reliance when the only thing at stake is their individual success, which is not true during a team match. For me, one of the most enjoyable parts of tennis is the need to continually analyze, especially at changeovers, what's working for you and what's not, what's working for your opponent and how to try to counter it. Makes it more than just thwacking a ball over a net. The most enjoyable wins are when your opponent is equally or more skillful than you at hitting the ball, but you are able to figure out during the match how to play them most effectively.
I really liked the recent pro tournaments when the intra-match coaching visits were televised, it was really interesting and informative to hear what they had to say, which was a mixture of one or two tactical things and some encouragement. It was startling to me, hearing the players talk in those visits, how un-confident some of them were--I always thought of pro players as necessarily supremely confident but I was wrong.
I think the 4-0 final score is a little misleading: had all the matches been played out, it probably would have been 5-2 or 4-3.
I know when Stanford players have to play each other in a tournament, there is a strict no-coaching rule. I don't remember the coaches being completely absent from NCAA singles play, my impression is they are definitely more restrained about lending advice than they are during team play. Maybe they are trying to encourage more self-reliance when the only thing at stake is their individual success, which is not true during a team match. For me, one of the most enjoyable parts of tennis is the need to continually analyze, especially at changeovers, what's working for you and what's not, what's working for your opponent and how to try to counter it. Makes it more than just thwacking a ball over a net. The most enjoyable wins are when your opponent is equally or more skillful than you at hitting the ball, but you are able to figure out during the match how to play them most effectively.
I really liked the recent pro tournaments when the intra-match coaching visits were televised, it was really interesting and informative to hear what they had to say, which was a mixture of one or two tactical things and some encouragement. It was startling to me, hearing the players talk in those visits, how un-confident some of them were--I always thought of pro players as necessarily supremely confident but I was wrong.
(05-20-2019, 06:25 PM)terry Wrote: The singles seemed to me to be about as drama-free as an NCAA final can be. Lord, Lampl, and Shin . . . got through the three second sets in good order. There was never much cause for real worry in those three matches.Probably just my nature, but I felt some drama there toward the end. Lord completely imploded while losing two games toward the end of the second set, and if she had lost that deciding point that won her the match, she easily could have lost that set (I would have expected her to turn it around in the third set, but you never know--she had two 2-set losses against that player in previous matches). Lampl starting making errors when she was close to closing it out, as did Shin. Given that at those times we were losing on two courts, and Higuchi was either getting pulled into a tiebreaker or down a break in the second set to a player that had dominated her in their previous meeting, I was getting a little tense there! Had we not won the doubles point, I would have been even more stressed then.
I think the 4-0 final score is a little misleading: had all the matches been played out, it probably would have been 5-2 or 4-3.
05-21-2019, 01:24 PM
(This post was last modified: 05-21-2019, 01:49 PM by ColoradoTree.)
Some stats from the official team write-up that caught my eye:
* Lele Forood gets her 10th national championship in 19 seasons, tying her with the great Frank Brennan.
* She has a career 466-44 record across those 19 seasons, for a .914 winning percentage. Her average season is 25-2.
* In her head coaching career (started in 2000-01), every single class has won at least one national title. Every single one. The last Stanford women's tennis class to finish without a NCAA championship graduated in 1996, when Lele was an assistant coach.
If you haven't read this piece about the women's tennis program from a couple years' back, focusing on Lele Forood and Frankie Brennan, you should: https://stanford_ftp.sidearmsports.com/c...index.html
It's not in the official write-up, but here are some other ridiculous stats:
* Stanford has never failed to advance past the regional stage.
* Stanford has never failed to reach the final site.
* Lele has a 155-12 record (.928) in Pac-10/12 play as a head coach.
* In her 19 seasons, Stanford has gone undefeated in conference play 12 times, including the last three seasons. Her worst conference record is 7-3 in 2015.
* Arguably her two worst seasons were 2009 (19-5, 6-2 Pac-10), when Stanford lost in the Round of 16 (our earliest exit ever) and 2015 (18-6, 7-3 Pac-12), when Stanford lost in the NCAA quarterfinals. She followed up both of those seasons with NCAA championships.
* She was the first woman to win a NCAA tennis championship as a head coach. She was joined by UCLA's Stella Sampras Webster in 2008, and they remain the only two women to win a NCAA championship as a head coach. (I think more programs are hiring women to coach women's tennis teams when there is a changing of the guard. Not a lot of turnover--if someone is good and the program is stable, you don't see a lot of calls to fire the women's tennis coach. UNC's coach has been there 16 years. Florida's coach has been there for 18. Duke's coach has been there 22. Vanderbilt's has been there 25. Georgia's Jeff Wallace has been there 34 years!)
* Lele Forood gets her 10th national championship in 19 seasons, tying her with the great Frank Brennan.
* She has a career 466-44 record across those 19 seasons, for a .914 winning percentage. Her average season is 25-2.
* In her head coaching career (started in 2000-01), every single class has won at least one national title. Every single one. The last Stanford women's tennis class to finish without a NCAA championship graduated in 1996, when Lele was an assistant coach.
If you haven't read this piece about the women's tennis program from a couple years' back, focusing on Lele Forood and Frankie Brennan, you should: https://stanford_ftp.sidearmsports.com/c...index.html
It's not in the official write-up, but here are some other ridiculous stats:
* Stanford has never failed to advance past the regional stage.
* Stanford has never failed to reach the final site.
* Lele has a 155-12 record (.928) in Pac-10/12 play as a head coach.
* In her 19 seasons, Stanford has gone undefeated in conference play 12 times, including the last three seasons. Her worst conference record is 7-3 in 2015.
* Arguably her two worst seasons were 2009 (19-5, 6-2 Pac-10), when Stanford lost in the Round of 16 (our earliest exit ever) and 2015 (18-6, 7-3 Pac-12), when Stanford lost in the NCAA quarterfinals. She followed up both of those seasons with NCAA championships.
* She was the first woman to win a NCAA tennis championship as a head coach. She was joined by UCLA's Stella Sampras Webster in 2008, and they remain the only two women to win a NCAA championship as a head coach. (I think more programs are hiring women to coach women's tennis teams when there is a changing of the guard. Not a lot of turnover--if someone is good and the program is stable, you don't see a lot of calls to fire the women's tennis coach. UNC's coach has been there 16 years. Florida's coach has been there for 18. Duke's coach has been there 22. Vanderbilt's has been there 25. Georgia's Jeff Wallace has been there 34 years!)
(This post was last modified: 05-21-2019, 01:49 PM by ColoradoTree.)
Some stats from the official team write-up that caught my eye:
* Lele Forood gets her 10th national championship in 19 seasons, tying her with the great Frank Brennan.
* She has a career 466-44 record across those 19 seasons, for a .914 winning percentage. Her average season is 25-2.
* In her head coaching career (started in 2000-01), every single class has won at least one national title. Every single one. The last Stanford women's tennis class to finish without a NCAA championship graduated in 1996, when Lele was an assistant coach.
If you haven't read this piece about the women's tennis program from a couple years' back, focusing on Lele Forood and Frankie Brennan, you should: https://stanford_ftp.sidearmsports.com/c...index.html
It's not in the official write-up, but here are some other ridiculous stats:
* Stanford has never failed to advance past the regional stage.
* Stanford has never failed to reach the final site.
* Lele has a 155-12 record (.928) in Pac-10/12 play as a head coach.
* In her 19 seasons, Stanford has gone undefeated in conference play 12 times, including the last three seasons. Her worst conference record is 7-3 in 2015.
* Arguably her two worst seasons were 2009 (19-5, 6-2 Pac-10), when Stanford lost in the Round of 16 (our earliest exit ever) and 2015 (18-6, 7-3 Pac-12), when Stanford lost in the NCAA quarterfinals. She followed up both of those seasons with NCAA championships.
* She was the first woman to win a NCAA tennis championship as a head coach. She was joined by UCLA's Stella Sampras Webster in 2008, and they remain the only two women to win a NCAA championship as a head coach. (I think more programs are hiring women to coach women's tennis teams when there is a changing of the guard. Not a lot of turnover--if someone is good and the program is stable, you don't see a lot of calls to fire the women's tennis coach. UNC's coach has been there 16 years. Florida's coach has been there for 18. Duke's coach has been there 22. Vanderbilt's has been there 25. Georgia's Jeff Wallace has been there 34 years!)
* Lele Forood gets her 10th national championship in 19 seasons, tying her with the great Frank Brennan.
* She has a career 466-44 record across those 19 seasons, for a .914 winning percentage. Her average season is 25-2.
* In her head coaching career (started in 2000-01), every single class has won at least one national title. Every single one. The last Stanford women's tennis class to finish without a NCAA championship graduated in 1996, when Lele was an assistant coach.
If you haven't read this piece about the women's tennis program from a couple years' back, focusing on Lele Forood and Frankie Brennan, you should: https://stanford_ftp.sidearmsports.com/c...index.html
It's not in the official write-up, but here are some other ridiculous stats:
* Stanford has never failed to advance past the regional stage.
* Stanford has never failed to reach the final site.
* Lele has a 155-12 record (.928) in Pac-10/12 play as a head coach.
* In her 19 seasons, Stanford has gone undefeated in conference play 12 times, including the last three seasons. Her worst conference record is 7-3 in 2015.
* Arguably her two worst seasons were 2009 (19-5, 6-2 Pac-10), when Stanford lost in the Round of 16 (our earliest exit ever) and 2015 (18-6, 7-3 Pac-12), when Stanford lost in the NCAA quarterfinals. She followed up both of those seasons with NCAA championships.
* She was the first woman to win a NCAA tennis championship as a head coach. She was joined by UCLA's Stella Sampras Webster in 2008, and they remain the only two women to win a NCAA championship as a head coach. (I think more programs are hiring women to coach women's tennis teams when there is a changing of the guard. Not a lot of turnover--if someone is good and the program is stable, you don't see a lot of calls to fire the women's tennis coach. UNC's coach has been there 16 years. Florida's coach has been there for 18. Duke's coach has been there 22. Vanderbilt's has been there 25. Georgia's Jeff Wallace has been there 34 years!)
05-22-2019, 03:16 PM
(This post was last modified: 05-23-2019, 08:55 AM by ColoradoTree.)
This should not come as a shock to you, because by rule the ITA is obligated to rank the national champion #1, but Stanford is #1 in the final ITA team rankings that came out today. (The final singles and doubles rankings come out next week.)
Final Top 10, plus Pac-12 teams and others we played:
1. Stanford
2. Georgia
3. UNC
4. Duke
5. South Carolina
6. Pepperdine
7. UCLA
8. Vanderbilt
9. Texas
10. Washington
13. Kansas
16. USC
18. Cal
26. LSU
30. Syracuse
33. Princeton
34. Arizona State
36. Washington State
44. Utah
49. Arizona
74. Colorado
(FYI, in the final rankings, they go from 50 to 75)
Final Top 10, plus Pac-12 teams and others we played:
1. Stanford
2. Georgia
3. UNC
4. Duke
5. South Carolina
6. Pepperdine
7. UCLA
8. Vanderbilt
9. Texas
10. Washington
13. Kansas
16. USC
18. Cal
26. LSU
30. Syracuse
33. Princeton
34. Arizona State
36. Washington State
44. Utah
49. Arizona
74. Colorado
(FYI, in the final rankings, they go from 50 to 75)
(This post was last modified: 05-23-2019, 08:55 AM by ColoradoTree.)
This should not come as a shock to you, because by rule the ITA is obligated to rank the national champion #1, but Stanford is #1 in the final ITA team rankings that came out today. (The final singles and doubles rankings come out next week.)
Final Top 10, plus Pac-12 teams and others we played:
1. Stanford
2. Georgia
3. UNC
4. Duke
5. South Carolina
6. Pepperdine
7. UCLA
8. Vanderbilt
9. Texas
10. Washington
13. Kansas
16. USC
18. Cal
26. LSU
30. Syracuse
33. Princeton
34. Arizona State
36. Washington State
44. Utah
49. Arizona
74. Colorado
(FYI, in the final rankings, they go from 50 to 75)
Final Top 10, plus Pac-12 teams and others we played:
1. Stanford
2. Georgia
3. UNC
4. Duke
5. South Carolina
6. Pepperdine
7. UCLA
8. Vanderbilt
9. Texas
10. Washington
13. Kansas
16. USC
18. Cal
26. LSU
30. Syracuse
33. Princeton
34. Arizona State
36. Washington State
44. Utah
49. Arizona
74. Colorado
(FYI, in the final rankings, they go from 50 to 75)
05-23-2019, 06:03 AM
(05-22-2019, 03:16 PM)ColoradoTree Wrote: This should not come as a shock to you, because by rule the ITA is obligated to rank the national champion #1, but Stanford is #1 in the final ITA team rankings that came out today.
So, if not for the rule obligating ITA to rank the national champ #1, would Stanford still be #1 by their points system?
(05-22-2019, 03:16 PM)ColoradoTree Wrote: This should not come as a shock to you, because by rule the ITA is obligated to rank the national champion #1, but Stanford is #1 in the final ITA team rankings that came out today.
So, if not for the rule obligating ITA to rank the national champ #1, would Stanford still be #1 by their points system?
05-23-2019, 08:32 AM
(This post was last modified: 05-23-2019, 09:10 AM by ColoradoTree.)
(05-23-2019, 06:03 AM)CTcard Wrote:(05-22-2019, 03:16 PM)ColoradoTree Wrote: This should not come as a shock to you, because by rule the ITA is obligated to rank the national champion #1, but Stanford is #1 in the final ITA team rankings that came out today.
So, if not for the rule obligating ITA to rank the national champ #1, would Stanford still be #1 by their points system?
If we were just counting the top 10 wins and dividing by losses? I'm not sure. But in addition to automatically ranking the champion #1, the ITA puts extra weight on NCAA team matches to basically ensure that the teams who advanced the furthest end up ranked the highest: you get 1 bonus point for reaching the second round, 2 for reaching the Round of 16, 3 for reaching the quarterfinals, 4 for reaching the semis, and 6 for reaching the finals. Adding in those bonus points gave Stanford a 90.97 ranking average, Georgia a 90.08, and UNC a 86.78.
I'm not sure whether the bonus points are added to your total before you divide by matches and losses, or if they're just added to your score at the end of it all, but we can do the exercise to answer your question (just using the pre-NCAA calculation without bonus points) between those three teams, based on the pre-NCAA team rankings:
Georgia: #1 UNC, #3 Stanford, #4 South Carolina (away), #5 Duke, #8 Vanderbilt (Indoor Nationals), #8 Vanderbilt (reg season), #8 Vanderbilt (NCAAs), #12 N.C. State, #16 Michigan, and #20 Tennessee (away) against two losses, to #3 Stanford and #4 South Carolina, for a total of 83.49
North Carolina: #5 Duke (Indoor Nationals), #5 Duke (reg season), #5 Duke (ACC tournament), #7 UCLA (Indoor Nationals), #7 UCLA (NCAAs), #8 Vanderbilt (away), #11 Florida State, #12 N.C. State (away), #16 Michigan (away), and #21 Virginia (away), against two losses, to #2 Georgia and #3 Stanford, for a total of 81.2
Stanford: #1 UNC, #2 Georgia, #6 Pepperdine, #7 UCLA (away), #7 UCLA (P12), #8 Vanderbilt, #9 Texas, #13 USC (away), #13 USC, and #14 Kansas, against one loss, to #2 Georgia, for a total of 84.51
If you do the calculations first and then add the bonus points, that's about right, because Stanford would be 90.51, Georgia would be 89.49, and UNC would be 85.2. (These don't line up with the exact pre-NCAA numbers because those are double-run, so they would have done what I just did and then run it again based on what that spit out in terms of a new ordering of teams, with only the second run being published.)
So, yes, even without taking the bonus points into account, if they just did the rankings now the same way they did before NCAAs, we'd still be #1.
FYI, the next tennis news we're likely to get is the ITA Kickoff Weekend draft, which should be in a couple of weeks. (Last year, it was the first week of June.) I assume we'll play it again next year, given the importance of being in the top 8. If not, then Lele better have a doozy of a non-conference schedule on tap.
(This post was last modified: 05-23-2019, 09:10 AM by ColoradoTree.)
(05-23-2019, 06:03 AM)CTcard Wrote:(05-22-2019, 03:16 PM)ColoradoTree Wrote: This should not come as a shock to you, because by rule the ITA is obligated to rank the national champion #1, but Stanford is #1 in the final ITA team rankings that came out today.
So, if not for the rule obligating ITA to rank the national champ #1, would Stanford still be #1 by their points system?
If we were just counting the top 10 wins and dividing by losses? I'm not sure. But in addition to automatically ranking the champion #1, the ITA puts extra weight on NCAA team matches to basically ensure that the teams who advanced the furthest end up ranked the highest: you get 1 bonus point for reaching the second round, 2 for reaching the Round of 16, 3 for reaching the quarterfinals, 4 for reaching the semis, and 6 for reaching the finals. Adding in those bonus points gave Stanford a 90.97 ranking average, Georgia a 90.08, and UNC a 86.78.
I'm not sure whether the bonus points are added to your total before you divide by matches and losses, or if they're just added to your score at the end of it all, but we can do the exercise to answer your question (just using the pre-NCAA calculation without bonus points) between those three teams, based on the pre-NCAA team rankings:
Georgia: #1 UNC, #3 Stanford, #4 South Carolina (away), #5 Duke, #8 Vanderbilt (Indoor Nationals), #8 Vanderbilt (reg season), #8 Vanderbilt (NCAAs), #12 N.C. State, #16 Michigan, and #20 Tennessee (away) against two losses, to #3 Stanford and #4 South Carolina, for a total of 83.49
North Carolina: #5 Duke (Indoor Nationals), #5 Duke (reg season), #5 Duke (ACC tournament), #7 UCLA (Indoor Nationals), #7 UCLA (NCAAs), #8 Vanderbilt (away), #11 Florida State, #12 N.C. State (away), #16 Michigan (away), and #21 Virginia (away), against two losses, to #2 Georgia and #3 Stanford, for a total of 81.2
Stanford: #1 UNC, #2 Georgia, #6 Pepperdine, #7 UCLA (away), #7 UCLA (P12), #8 Vanderbilt, #9 Texas, #13 USC (away), #13 USC, and #14 Kansas, against one loss, to #2 Georgia, for a total of 84.51
If you do the calculations first and then add the bonus points, that's about right, because Stanford would be 90.51, Georgia would be 89.49, and UNC would be 85.2. (These don't line up with the exact pre-NCAA numbers because those are double-run, so they would have done what I just did and then run it again based on what that spit out in terms of a new ordering of teams, with only the second run being published.)
So, yes, even without taking the bonus points into account, if they just did the rankings now the same way they did before NCAAs, we'd still be #1.
FYI, the next tennis news we're likely to get is the ITA Kickoff Weekend draft, which should be in a couple of weeks. (Last year, it was the first week of June.) I assume we'll play it again next year, given the importance of being in the top 8. If not, then Lele better have a doozy of a non-conference schedule on tap.
05-23-2019, 10:04 AM
(This post was last modified: 05-23-2019, 10:05 AM by ColoradoTree.)
(05-23-2019, 10:00 AM)terry Wrote:(05-23-2019, 08:32 AM)ColoradoTree Wrote: Stanford: #1 UNC, #2 Georgia, #6 Pepperdine, #7 UCLA (away), #7 UCLA (P12), #8 Vanderbilt, #9 Texas, #13 USC (away), #13 USC, and #14 Kansas, against one loss, to #2 Georgia, for a total of 84.51
Also #10 Washington, right?
Yes! Sorry I missed that! Replacing Kansas with Washington makes our total 85.3, based on the pre-NCAAs rankings. (Beating #1 and #2 sure helps a lot, since #1 is worth 106 points and #2 is worth 102. Beating #5 is 91, and beating #10 is just 77.)
(This post was last modified: 05-23-2019, 10:05 AM by ColoradoTree.)
(05-23-2019, 10:00 AM)terry Wrote:(05-23-2019, 08:32 AM)ColoradoTree Wrote: Stanford: #1 UNC, #2 Georgia, #6 Pepperdine, #7 UCLA (away), #7 UCLA (P12), #8 Vanderbilt, #9 Texas, #13 USC (away), #13 USC, and #14 Kansas, against one loss, to #2 Georgia, for a total of 84.51
Also #10 Washington, right?
Yes! Sorry I missed that! Replacing Kansas with Washington makes our total 85.3, based on the pre-NCAAs rankings. (Beating #1 and #2 sure helps a lot, since #1 is worth 106 points and #2 is worth 102. Beating #5 is 91, and beating #10 is just 77.)
05-23-2019, 10:09 AM
(05-23-2019, 08:32 AM)ColoradoTree Wrote: So, yes, even without taking the bonus points into account, if they just did the rankings now the same way they did before NCAAs, we'd still be #1.
Interesting, and nice thorough analysis.
I rather suspect you'd have found a different answer last year (and please don't actually do it) when we went from #15 to #1 at the final rankings. Though, at least with the bonus points I guess that worked out, as they list Stanford at 83.01 points (up from 45.77 in the penultimate rankings) to #2 Vanderbilt's 82.01.
I see that the ITA has a nice rankings archive, so it's easy to dig up a lot of stuff about previous years.
(05-23-2019, 08:32 AM)ColoradoTree Wrote: So, yes, even without taking the bonus points into account, if they just did the rankings now the same way they did before NCAAs, we'd still be #1.
Interesting, and nice thorough analysis.
I rather suspect you'd have found a different answer last year (and please don't actually do it) when we went from #15 to #1 at the final rankings. Though, at least with the bonus points I guess that worked out, as they list Stanford at 83.01 points (up from 45.77 in the penultimate rankings) to #2 Vanderbilt's 82.01.
I see that the ITA has a nice rankings archive, so it's easy to dig up a lot of stuff about previous years.
05-23-2019, 11:45 AM
(This post was last modified: 05-23-2019, 12:00 PM by ColoradoTree.)
The rankings archive is pretty great, and yeah, I agree that we wouldn't have finished #1 last year without the help of the bonus points.
You know, I don't think the "automatic #1" provision has ever been needed, since Stanford is the lowest-ranked team ever to win it all, and even then (as a 15 seed in '16 and in '18), Stanford made it to #1 with the help of the bonus points. Of course, it helps when you get wins over the #1, #2, #3, #7, and #17 teams over the course of the NCAA tournament, and only your best ten wins count anyway.
Given that fact, the only way I can really imagine the "automatic #1" provision coming into play is if an excellent team on paper had bad injury luck but got everyone back healthy for NCAAs--i.e., a more extreme version of Stanford's 2018 season. And it doesn't even need to be that much more extreme. Say Stanford doesn't beat UCLA last year when Lord is out (a 4-3 win turns into a 3-4 loss) and we no longer have our very best pre-NCAA win (and our 5th-best win overall). Given how weak our schedule was otherwise, I'm confident our final ranking average would have been below Vanderbilt's, even with bonus points.
Season-ending ranking for Stanford women's tennis during Lele Forood's tenure:
2019: #1
2018: #1
2017: #2
2016: #1
2015: #11
2014: #8
2013: #1
2012: #5
2011: #2
2010: #1
2009: #13
2008: #7
2007: #2
2006: #1
2005: #1
2004: #1
2003: #2
2002: #1
2001: #1
(In looking back through this, though, I realized my guess was wrong and the "automatic #1" provision has been used at least once--Duke in 2009. See: http://itatennis.activecm.net/resultsand..._22_09.htm. Weirdly, Duke won as the #3 seed and still needed the automatic #1 provision, so they must have changed the bonus points since then.)
You know, I don't think the "automatic #1" provision has ever been needed, since Stanford is the lowest-ranked team ever to win it all, and even then (as a 15 seed in '16 and in '18), Stanford made it to #1 with the help of the bonus points. Of course, it helps when you get wins over the #1, #2, #3, #7, and #17 teams over the course of the NCAA tournament, and only your best ten wins count anyway.
Given that fact, the only way I can really imagine the "automatic #1" provision coming into play is if an excellent team on paper had bad injury luck but got everyone back healthy for NCAAs--i.e., a more extreme version of Stanford's 2018 season. And it doesn't even need to be that much more extreme. Say Stanford doesn't beat UCLA last year when Lord is out (a 4-3 win turns into a 3-4 loss) and we no longer have our very best pre-NCAA win (and our 5th-best win overall). Given how weak our schedule was otherwise, I'm confident our final ranking average would have been below Vanderbilt's, even with bonus points.
Season-ending ranking for Stanford women's tennis during Lele Forood's tenure:
2019: #1
2018: #1
2017: #2
2016: #1
2015: #11
2014: #8
2013: #1
2012: #5
2011: #2
2010: #1
2009: #13
2008: #7
2007: #2
2006: #1
2005: #1
2004: #1
2003: #2
2002: #1
2001: #1
(In looking back through this, though, I realized my guess was wrong and the "automatic #1" provision has been used at least once--Duke in 2009. See: http://itatennis.activecm.net/resultsand..._22_09.htm. Weirdly, Duke won as the #3 seed and still needed the automatic #1 provision, so they must have changed the bonus points since then.)
(This post was last modified: 05-23-2019, 12:00 PM by ColoradoTree.)
The rankings archive is pretty great, and yeah, I agree that we wouldn't have finished #1 last year without the help of the bonus points.
You know, I don't think the "automatic #1" provision has ever been needed, since Stanford is the lowest-ranked team ever to win it all, and even then (as a 15 seed in '16 and in '18), Stanford made it to #1 with the help of the bonus points. Of course, it helps when you get wins over the #1, #2, #3, #7, and #17 teams over the course of the NCAA tournament, and only your best ten wins count anyway.
Given that fact, the only way I can really imagine the "automatic #1" provision coming into play is if an excellent team on paper had bad injury luck but got everyone back healthy for NCAAs--i.e., a more extreme version of Stanford's 2018 season. And it doesn't even need to be that much more extreme. Say Stanford doesn't beat UCLA last year when Lord is out (a 4-3 win turns into a 3-4 loss) and we no longer have our very best pre-NCAA win (and our 5th-best win overall). Given how weak our schedule was otherwise, I'm confident our final ranking average would have been below Vanderbilt's, even with bonus points.
Season-ending ranking for Stanford women's tennis during Lele Forood's tenure:
2019: #1
2018: #1
2017: #2
2016: #1
2015: #11
2014: #8
2013: #1
2012: #5
2011: #2
2010: #1
2009: #13
2008: #7
2007: #2
2006: #1
2005: #1
2004: #1
2003: #2
2002: #1
2001: #1
(In looking back through this, though, I realized my guess was wrong and the "automatic #1" provision has been used at least once--Duke in 2009. See: http://itatennis.activecm.net/resultsand..._22_09.htm. Weirdly, Duke won as the #3 seed and still needed the automatic #1 provision, so they must have changed the bonus points since then.)
You know, I don't think the "automatic #1" provision has ever been needed, since Stanford is the lowest-ranked team ever to win it all, and even then (as a 15 seed in '16 and in '18), Stanford made it to #1 with the help of the bonus points. Of course, it helps when you get wins over the #1, #2, #3, #7, and #17 teams over the course of the NCAA tournament, and only your best ten wins count anyway.
Given that fact, the only way I can really imagine the "automatic #1" provision coming into play is if an excellent team on paper had bad injury luck but got everyone back healthy for NCAAs--i.e., a more extreme version of Stanford's 2018 season. And it doesn't even need to be that much more extreme. Say Stanford doesn't beat UCLA last year when Lord is out (a 4-3 win turns into a 3-4 loss) and we no longer have our very best pre-NCAA win (and our 5th-best win overall). Given how weak our schedule was otherwise, I'm confident our final ranking average would have been below Vanderbilt's, even with bonus points.
Season-ending ranking for Stanford women's tennis during Lele Forood's tenure:
2019: #1
2018: #1
2017: #2
2016: #1
2015: #11
2014: #8
2013: #1
2012: #5
2011: #2
2010: #1
2009: #13
2008: #7
2007: #2
2006: #1
2005: #1
2004: #1
2003: #2
2002: #1
2001: #1
(In looking back through this, though, I realized my guess was wrong and the "automatic #1" provision has been used at least once--Duke in 2009. See: http://itatennis.activecm.net/resultsand..._22_09.htm. Weirdly, Duke won as the #3 seed and still needed the automatic #1 provision, so they must have changed the bonus points since then.)
05-24-2019, 07:41 AM
(05-23-2019, 02:08 PM)BostonCard Wrote: Sheesh, the numbers other than 1 do stick out.
I'm struck by the numbers other than 1 or 2-- only 5 times we've finished lower than first or second.
Does anyone know how many times in that period we did not play in the championship match? (some of those second places might not have been a loss in the championship match)
(05-23-2019, 02:08 PM)BostonCard Wrote: Sheesh, the numbers other than 1 do stick out.
I'm struck by the numbers other than 1 or 2-- only 5 times we've finished lower than first or second.
Does anyone know how many times in that period we did not play in the championship match? (some of those second places might not have been a loss in the championship match)
05-24-2019, 07:52 AM
(05-24-2019, 07:41 AM)oldalum Wrote:(05-23-2019, 02:08 PM)BostonCard Wrote: Sheesh, the numbers other than 1 do stick out.
I'm struck by the numbers other than 1 or 2-- only 5 times we've finished lower than first or second.
Does anyone know how many times in that period we did not play in the championship match? (some of those second places might not have been a loss in the championship match)
Lele's coaching bio has a helpful rundown of how far we made it each year: https://gostanford.com/coaches.aspx?rc=3410&path=wten
Comparing that to the rankings, it looks like we finished #2 in 2007 but lost in the semis. The three other #2 finishes came in NCAA runner-up years.
In Lele's 19 years, we have played in the championship match 13 times, winning 10 of them. The other 6 years saw us lose in the semifinals twice, in the quarterfinals three times, and in one dark, dark year, the *gasp* Round of 16!
(05-24-2019, 07:41 AM)oldalum Wrote:(05-23-2019, 02:08 PM)BostonCard Wrote: Sheesh, the numbers other than 1 do stick out.
I'm struck by the numbers other than 1 or 2-- only 5 times we've finished lower than first or second.
Does anyone know how many times in that period we did not play in the championship match? (some of those second places might not have been a loss in the championship match)
Lele's coaching bio has a helpful rundown of how far we made it each year: https://gostanford.com/coaches.aspx?rc=3410&path=wten
Comparing that to the rankings, it looks like we finished #2 in 2007 but lost in the semis. The three other #2 finishes came in NCAA runner-up years.
In Lele's 19 years, we have played in the championship match 13 times, winning 10 of them. The other 6 years saw us lose in the semifinals twice, in the quarterfinals three times, and in one dark, dark year, the *gasp* Round of 16!
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