Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Printable Version
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RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 10-02-2023
Their second round match is on Court 6 right now, but the score still shows the score from partway through their first match, so no idea how things are going.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Lorcan - 10-02-2023
Ma/Yepifanova def. Alvarez Sande/Tse 8-4. They move on to face the seven seeds, Racjecki/Zampardo of NC State. This duo is ranked #43 in the preseason rankings. For reference, Ma/Yepifanova were ranked #60 in the preseason rankings.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Spiny_Norman - 10-02-2023
(10-02-2023, 04:19 PM)Lorcan Wrote: Ma/Yepifanova def. Alvarez Sande/Tse 8-4. They move on to face the seven seeds, Racjecki/Zampardo of NC State. This duo is ranked #43 in the preseason rankings. For reference, Ma/Yepifanova were ranked #60 in the preseason rankings.
Ma played and won 3 matches today?!!? She's a warrior.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Lorcan - 10-03-2023
It looks like Hui is getting going in her consolation match on court 4.
Alexis Blokhina fell to Wooten of Wake Forest 6-2 7-5. Connie Ma was also bundled out of qualifying with a 6-2 6-2 loss to Scotty of the University of North Carolina.
It looks like our contingent in the main draw will be Yepifanova and Blake. We'll see if Ma/Yepifanova can join Blake/Blokhina in the main draw for doubles.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 10-03-2023
Ugh. Ma has no business losing to Scotty, especially by that lopsided of a scoreline. This tournament had given me a lot of hope, but that result is really disappointing.
But it's just one match, right? Let's see how she does now in Northwest Regionals.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 10-03-2023
Ugh, and Hui lost 2 and 4 to Rabman. That shouldn't happen, either.
Well, uh, this is what the fall season is for. You're not in peak form yet, and some things aren't working, and you fix them before January. That said, I would dearly love to see some good wins from Blake and Yepifanova in the main draw.
Curious to see whether Blake vaults over Ma this season (something that would've been unthinkable two years ago, but Ma's failure to develop and improve as much as Yepifanova and Blake have leaves that door open).
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Lorcan - 10-03-2023
It’s a bit more jarring when Scotty withdraws from her next match due to illness (at least officially) after beating Ma.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - oldalum - 10-03-2023
OT, but the Stanford Hall of Fame acceptance speech last week by one of our all-time greats, Nicole Gibbs.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 10-04-2023
FYI, the main draw gets going today!
Yepifanova was scheduled to play #72 Abigail Rencheli of N.C. State at 7:45am, and it looks like they're on Court 12 now, but no scores are up.
Blake plays 4th-seeded (and 5th-ranked) Reese Brantmeier of UNC at 8:30am. Not an ideal draw, but a great early challenge.
In doubles, Blake/Blokhina are the 4th seed and they play UNC's Forbes/Tran at 12:30pm. That'll be an incredibly tough match, but they're all tough at this point.
(As always, all times are in Pacific for you West Coasters.)
(10-03-2023, 07:55 PM)oldalum Wrote: OT, but the Stanford Hall of Fame acceptance speech last week by one of our all-time greats, Nicole Gibbs.
Gibbsy is an absolute legend. Think the world of her, and somewhere in the archives here, there's probably a post where I lose my mind about her comeback in the championship match against Texas A&M where she lost the first 8 games of the match but then went ahead and won the last 12. She deserves her flowers.
Yepifanova leads Rencheli 6-1, 1-0 (on serve so far in the second)
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 10-04-2023
Yepifanova advances, 6-1, 6-4.
Blake is on Court 4 right now, and it looks like they split the first two sets, with Blake winning the first 6-4 and Brantmeier taking the second 7-5.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Lorcan - 10-04-2023
I don't know what the final score was, but looks like Angelica Blake has just upset Reese Brantmeier to move on.
Blake won 6-4 5-7 7-5
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 10-04-2023
That is a terrific result for Blake. Love it. Has she taken a leap? She's steadily improved over her time at Stanford, which is not always something we see in the program, but that's a great result for her!
She gets #47 Jessica Alsola of Cal next, while Yepifanova gets 3rd-seeded (and 3rd-ranked) Alexa Noel of Miami, who's a two-time All-American in singles and who transferred from Iowa before last season. Blake's test is much more manageable, even though Alsola played #1 and #2 for Cal last year as a sophomore (and held down the #2 court as a freshman), but don't count Yepifanova out! Both of these matches will be tough, but an objective observer would have to give Blake the better chance of advancing.
FYI, at Northwest Regionals last year, Blokhina beat Alsola in three sets, and in the dual match in April, Yepifanova beat her on the top line, 7-6, 6-2.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Lorcan - 10-04-2023
Blake/Blokhina getting started against UNC's Forbes/Tran just now on Court 12.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 10-04-2023
(10-04-2023, 01:09 PM)Lorcan Wrote: Blake/Blokhina getting started against UNC's Forbes/Tran just now on Court 12.
It remains deeply disappointing that either the site or Playsight is falling down completely on ensuring timely and accurate scoring. It's one of the biggest tournaments of the year, and it's a crapshoot as to whether we get live scoring on a particular match. Come on, folks! We can't get a few local volunteers to update the score after each game?
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 10-04-2023
Blake/Blokhina advance, winning 6-4, 6-2! Great result there against an excellent duo from UNC. They'll play a pair from Auburn sometime tomorrow.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 10-04-2023
Blake's singles match tomorrow is at 8:00am, while Yepifanova's is at 8:30am.
Blake/Blokhina have their R16 doubles match at 12:30pm. Go Card!
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Sakibomb25 - 10-05-2023
Any idea or theories why Ma seems to have digressed in her play? Is it just others physically catching up to her, a loss of motivation, finding out there is more to Stanford than just tennis?
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Lorcan - 10-05-2023
Today isn't off to a good start as Blake drops the first set 6-2 against Jessica Alsola of Cal.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 10-05-2023
(10-05-2023, 12:59 AM)Sakibomb25 Wrote: Any idea or theories why Ma seems to have digressed in her play? Is it just others physically catching up to her, a loss of motivation, finding out there is more to Stanford than just tennis?
I mean, I have no idea what the issue actually is, but all of those are plausible theories.
It's funny, you sometimes see some stagnation when a player can no longer be on court constantly because they have a demanding courseload and other responsibilities. But if any player seemed set up well to work around that, it was Ma, given that she played fewer matches as a junior player and lived a normal high school student life. She was the rare player who would actually be playing more matches and having more training in a college atmosphere than before. And heck, she went to the NCAA singles final as a freshman.
And I could be putting too much stock in one loss here. We could see her back at #1 in the first dual match of the spring season, and it wouldn't be all that shocking. But I was expecting a step forward in her game last season, and it didn't materialize. She came into her freshman year playing like a dominant force, and that force was lacking last year. Anyone's guess as to why. And maybe she's worked through all of that, and this match against Scotty could just be a hiccup where she was a little sore. She hasn't been playing this frequently for a while, so we'll see how she does next time out.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 10-05-2023
Sigh, and they both lost. Yepifanova went down 7-6, 6-2, while Blake lost 2 & 2. Maybe doubles will be better!