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Women's Tennis: 2019 ITA Fall Nationals & San Diego State Classic - Printable Version

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RE: Women's Tennis: 2019 ITA Fall Nationals & San Diego State Classic - ColoradoTree - 11-08-2019

(11-07-2019, 05:12 PM)oldalum Wrote:  
(11-07-2019, 04:26 PM)ColoradoTree Wrote:   UCLA is about to have three players in the last 16. We don't have any. UCLA has two doubles teams in the last 16. We don't have any.
OK, now you can sound the alarm.

It's always possible our depth saves us in the end, as it usually does. For whatever reason, this team always does so much better in team play than it does in individual play. We'll still be really good. But I no longer think we're the favorite to win the conference championship. And Cal is way better than I thought they'd be, so we could be in for a fairly disappointing season by our standards (i.e., losing a couple of conference matches, barely being a top 16 seed, going out in the NCAA quarters, etc.)

RE: Women's Tennis: 2019 ITA Fall Nationals & San Diego State Classic - martyup - 11-08-2019

Hey, you have to play it out and let the chips fall.  Don't forget how many times the Stanford women have taken down higher ranked teams.  Optimism is contagious, as is pessimism.

RE: Women's Tennis: 2019 ITA Fall Nationals & San Diego State Classic - ColoradoTree - 11-08-2019

Shifting gears, we have draws for the San Diego State Fall Classic! I wish Blake were here playing singles instead of having just played doubles in Newport Beach, but this talent level is about the same she cruised through at St. Mary's, so it might not have done much good anyway.  

A bit of news: Mossmer is in the field, but Higuchi is not. So, we'll get our first look at our other freshman, while Higuchi presumably continues to rest up. 

Friday

9:00am: Mossmer/Madurawe vs. Oosterbaan/Ronney (Montana)
10:00am: #93 Madurawe vs. Hada Chang (Denver)
10:00am: Mossmer vs. #118 Taylor Melville (Denver)
10:00am: #87 Choy vs. #105 T.J. Fumagalli (Air Force)

Unfortunately, it looks like no live scoring or video, so we'll need to rely on the other team's Twitter accounts and the other teams' write-ups of the events, since those almost always post before Stanford's do. 

No seeds listed, but there are several different brackets (red, white, black, gold, silver, and gray), which is pretty common in these invitational tournaments with different quality levels. All three of our players are in the white bracket, along with what look to be the best players from the other teams, so that's as expected. The only other ranked player in the white bracket is #96 Anna Riedmiller (Denver), and she'd be due to play Madurawe in the semifinals on Sunday. 

But after the disappointment of Fall Nationals, this is an opportunity for the back end of the lineup to show that it's up to the task of delivering team wins for Stanford this spring.
(11-08-2019, 09:23 AM)martyup Wrote:  Hey, you have to play it out and let the chips fall.  Don't forget how many times the Stanford women have taken down higher ranked teams.  Optimism is contagious, as is pessimism.

Oh, no question. We are rarely a great team in the fall, partly because our players tend to do better in a team environment (Caroline Lampl was usually a wild disappointment in the fall, and then look at what she did in the spring), and partly because no one makes in-season improvements and adjustments like Lele. I'm just saying that, for the first time in a while, we don't look to be the best team in the conference on paper. Which doesn't mean we won't win, of course. But it's more cause for concern than we've had in a while. 

Aside from the Northwest Regionals, which we own, we rarely make noise at the bigger fall tournaments. What's concerning me is that UCLA is making a lot of noise this year, and that's somewhat unusual for them, too.

RE: Women's Tennis: 2019 ITA Fall Nationals & San Diego State Classic - ColoradoTree - 11-08-2019

We should keep in mind that Shin is still alive in the consolation draw, and still has a chance to get some good wins and perhaps renew our hope that she'll be able to hold down the #3 or #4 spot successfully.  Today she goes up against #65 Sara Nayar of Colorado, who is likely to be #1 in the Buffs' lineup this year. With just 5 spots separating them in the preseason rankings, this should theoretically be a close match. Shin pulling off this win would be an encouraging sign, to say the least.

FYI, perhaps we should be a bit more sympathetic to Gordon's inability to close the deal against Giavara yesterday, and a bit more scared of Cal this season. Giavara just knocked off UNC's Alexa Graham, the 4 seed and the 4th-ranked player in the country in three tough sets.
Shin started poorly, getting down 1-4, but she battled back to 4-5. Nayar then served for the first set, but Shin got up 0-40 and converted the second break point to level the set at 5-5.

RE: Women's Tennis: 2019 ITA Fall Nationals & San Diego State Classic - oldalum - 11-08-2019

Shin is down a break 2-4 in the first set, but a competitive match so far.

in bad news, Cal's Giavara beat UNC's Alexa Graham, who was UNC's #2 last year and was All-American in singles and doubles

RE: Women's Tennis: 2019 ITA Fall Nationals & San Diego State Classic - ColoradoTree - 11-08-2019

(11-08-2019, 01:40 PM)oldalum Wrote:  Shin is down a break 2-4 in the first set, but a competitive match so far.

in bad news, Cal's Giavara beat UNC's Alexa Graham, who was UNC's #2 last year and was All-American in singles and doubles

Good news for us feeling bad about Michaela's performance, but yeah, very bad news for how dangerous Cal might be this year.
Serving at 5-5 after going on a 4-1 run of her own, Shin held to go up 6-5. Nayar held to force a tiebreaker, but Shin took it 7-3. Nice fight, Janice!
Now up 4-2 in the second with Nayar serving. Great job by Shin to turn this match around--now let's she if she can finish it.
She breaks Nayar, and she's serving for the match, up 7-6, 5-2.
She was down 15-40 and fought back to deciding point, but she got broken. Nayar will now serve down 3-5 in the second.

RE: Women's Tennis: 2019 ITA Fall Nationals & San Diego State Classic - ColoradoTree - 11-08-2019

Shin broke Nayar to end it, and she moves on! Up next is Georgia’s Vivian Wolff, who is ranked #37. Come on, Janice!

RE: Women's Tennis: 2019 ITA Fall Nationals & San Diego State Classic - ColoradoTree - 11-12-2019

To wrap up, Wolff crushed Shin, and that was the end of Fall Nationals for us. But Shin salvaged what started as a disastrous tournament for her and got a couple of respectable wins out of it, and that's really all you're looking to get out of Fall Nationals. 

Over in San Diego, Madurawe and Mossmer both got upset in the singles second round. Choy advanced to the semifinals, but lost there to the same player (an unranked junior from SDSU) that beat Mossmer. Doubles was more positive, with Madurawe and Mossmer teaming up to win the tournament. But even in singles, Mossmer and Choy booked ranked wins, which is the currency you're looking to hoard in the fall season.
Oh, and in reviewing Pac-12 performance at Fall Nationals, here's what ended up happening:

* #1 seed Elysia Bolton of UCLA lost a competitive match in the Round of 16 to 11th-seeded Kelly Chen of Duke. Bolton got a couple of good wins, but didn't beat a seeded player.
* #2 seed Abigail Forbes of UCLA lost pretty handily in the Quarterfinals to 5th-seeded Estela Perez-Somarriba of Miami, who has been a top 5 player in the country for a few years now. But Forbes easily beat Cal's Valentina Ivanov (a freshman who's had a good fall) as well as 12th-seeded Cameron Morra of UNC.
* #3 seed Jada Hart posted a couple of wins over middling opponents before she lost in three sets to 15th-seeded Mia Horvit of South Carolina. 
* Cal's Haley Giavara, the freshman who knocked off Gordon, followed up that three-setter with another win that went the distance, this time over #4 Alexa Graham of UNC, before losing in three sets to South Carolina's Megan Davies, who'd beaten two seeds before that match. 
* Ultimately, there were two Pac-12 players in the quarterfinals (Giavara and Forbes), and none in the semifinals. UNC's Sara Daavettila took the title over Texas's Anna Turati (who has been, to this point, the lesser of the two Turati twins, but she's now ranked higher than her sister). Conference-wise, the quarterfinals also had 3 ACC players, 2 SEC players, and 1 from the Big 12. The semis were 2 ACC, 1 SEC, and 1 Big 12. 
* In the consolation bracket, Mariia Kozyreva of St. Mary's took the title over Georgia's Vivian Wolff, which should boost Kozyreva's ranking (and, in turn, Gordon's ranking for beating Kozyreva at Northwest Regionals).
* In doubles, 5th-seeded Hart/Bolton of UCLA won the tournament, and Cal's Bright/Giavara made it to the semifinals before losing a three-setter to a N.C. State duo. Those two teams were the only ones from the conference in the quarterfinals. 
* In the consolation bracket, the team that beat Arbuthnott/Blake in a third-set match tiebreaker made it to the consolation final before losing a third-set match tiebreaker for the title. So, Arbuthnott/Blake had an incredibly unlucky draw, but fought hard in both matches. I'm optimistic about that pairing this year.