Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Printable Version
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RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 11-01-2023
OK, well, despite the disappointing end to Northwest Regionals, we do have two entrants (Connie Ma and Alexandra Yepifanova) in the final event of the fall season--Fall Nationals, which gets going today in San Diego. Ma will play singles, while Yepifanova is only in the doubles draw with Ma.
Ma got things going this morning by losing in a fairly lopsided upset to Michigan's Julia Fliegner, so we'll see what she can pull off in the consolation draw. Sigh.
In doubles, Ma/Yepifanova play a pair from Miami at 4:00pm.
You can stream matches live here: https://web.track.tennis/#/@8e877ccb-f14f-478c-a634-dc5c799a21e2/@8e877ccb-f14f-478c-a634-dc5c799a21e2/evt-Q4R0hX6qKuQ
And live scoring is here: https://ioncourt.com/tournaments/65410bc84afe6eef01df50b9/live-score
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Lorcan - 11-01-2023
Yepifanova and Ma win the first set against the duo from Miami that won their regional tournament. 7-5 in the first - on to the second!
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 11-14-2023
Ma ended up winning the consolation title at Fall Nationals, so good job, Connie!
She beat #51 Dana Guzman (Oklahoma) in straight sets and #47 Jessica Alsola (Cal) in three sets along the way, so another couple of ranked wins on her resume should help keep her ranked reasonably highly.
The final fall singles rankings drop tomorrow, so we'll see where our players end up after an eventful fall season.
Meanwhile, we have a new signee--#2 recruit Valerie Glozman of Bellevue, WA! Glozman has been committed to Stanford for a little while now, but she has now made it official. She's the top-ranked recruit in the class that'll be attending college, and she has won back-to-back Easter Bowl titles (one of the top junior tournaments in the US)--the first to win back-to-back titles at the 16U and 18U divisions since Cici Bellis a decade ago. Her name might be familiar as the younger sister of Vivian Glozman, who played tennis at Cal and UVA. Valerie is currently the sole recruit in our class, but she's a heckuva get, and she should feature in our lineup from the beginning.
Welcome, Valerie!
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - Sakibomb25 - 11-14-2023
Great summary as always.
Where do you see Glozman playing next year? In terms of previous classes, where would she stack up?
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 11-16-2023
The end-of-fall ITA singles and doubles rankings dropped, and here's where Stanford stacks up!
11. Connie Ma
48. Angelica Blake
49. Alexandra Yepifanova
50. Valencia Xu
64. Alexis Blokhina
5 in the singles rankings is pretty solid, outmatched by only UNC (who has 3 in the top 10, another 4 between 11 and 50, and none of those is preseason #1 Fiona Crawley, who played a lighter ITA schedule and focused on pro events, so UNC remains the top dog)
Oklahoma State, NC State, Georgia, and USC also have 5 ranked players, and more have 4. So, just based purely on rankings, we're solidly in the mix, but everyone is a clear step behind UNC. But you just gotta get 4 points on the day you play them, so why not? And having basically 8 ranked players is great for depth, but when only six can play, that advantage is somewhat minimized. Plus, we've got two of the top 5-ranked newcomers. Georgia also has two, but one of theirs cracked the rankings (Vecic at #35), so we're at basically 5+2 and they're at 5+1. Georgia leaned more heavily on their newcomers than we did this fall, which I don't think is an indication of the Georgia freshmen being better, but rather getting more opportunities for high-level matches. We eased ours in a bit more.
And in doubles:
#27 Blake/Blokhina
#28 Ma/Yepifanova
Two ranked doubles teams! I'll take it! Hopefully we can be a bit more stout in that department this year, and we won't constantly be needing four singles wins in the tougher matches.
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 11-16-2023
(11-14-2023, 02:52 PM)Sakibomb25 Wrote: Great summary as always.
Where do you see Glozman playing next year? In terms of previous classes, where would she stack up?
Good question. I think I need to see how this year plays out for her to have a better idea of where she could fit, and I also want to see what we get out of Hui and Yu this year. Glozman is excellent, but there's no way she beats out Ma or Yepifanova at the top of next year's lineup, I don't see it as likely at all for Glozman to overtake Blokhina or Xu (who will be a senior), either. Looking at the roster math, here's who you have at that point:
Fifth Years (0): (I'm assuming we're not inviting back Geller or Houghton--one never knows, especially if they're healthy and have taken a leap this year, but I doubt it.)
Seniors (3): Yepifanova, Ma, Xu
Juniors (2): Blokhina, Sun
Sophomores (2): Hui, Yu
Freshmen (1 for now): Glozman
I mean, some of this is just the first-world problem of deciding in what order a bunch of recruits who have been the #1 or #2 recruit in their respective classes should play. Glozman has been ranked #1 in her class, but is generally regarded as a clear #2 behind pro-bound Ngounoue; Yu was basically a wall-to-wall #1 recruit, though Hui sometimes hit #1 in the class; Blokhina finished as the #3 recruit, her peak; Ma was a wall-to-wall #1 like Yu, with Yepifanova breaking through sometimes to hit #1, too, though more frequently than Hui did; Xu was a top 5 recruit throughout high school until senior year, when she peaked at #8; and Houghton was a late bloomer, going from a peak of #20 as a HS sophomore to a top 5 recruit junior and senior years, finishing as the #3 recruit that year. Sun is the outlier, peaking at #10 but generally being one of the lowest-ranked blue chips that year. And Geller was a highly-ranked international player.
Glozman's recruiting profile is a step behind that of Ma and Yu, but she looks right in line with what we thought Yepifanova might be coming in, maybe a tick higher than what Blokhina or Hui were coming in. But the distinctions are pretty fine at this point, and there is a ton of room for growth. Sometimes that level continues to increase, and sometimes it just... doesn't. Sometimes it's fits and starts. They're still basically kids, and you never know how they're going to adjust to college. For many, it's less tennis than they might be used to playing, and for others (like Ma and Sun), it's more.
So, all that said--I think Glozman comes in as a legit challenger for a spot in the lineup, but we're just too deep ahead of her for her to vault to the top of the lineup like Ma and Yepifanova did. This year will be pretty illuminating in terms of the internal pecking order, and then we'll be able to get a sense of where she might fit in.
But you wanna talk title windows--we're in one right now, but especially with UNC graduating a few players after this year, you have to love our chances in 2024-25. I'd just hate it if Blake left campus without a ring--she'd be the first class to do that since the program went five years in between national titles in the mid-90s. But we have to be the title favorite going into 2024-25, with that senior class plus Blokhina, Hui, Yu, and Glozman likely featuring. (I don't think we're going to see enough improvement from Sun to see her as a regular part of the lineup going forward.)
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - BobK - 12-27-2023
A bump next match in 2 weeks
The schedule
https://gostanford.com/sports/womens-tennis/schedule
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - BobK - 12-27-2023
The schedule
https://gostanford.com/sports/womens-tennis/schedule
The roster
https://gostanford.com/sports/womens-tennis/roster
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - PVTree - 12-27-2023
What's our perceived best lineup?
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - BobK - 01-02-2024
Here are the 2024 commits
Valerie Glozman Bellevue WA Ranked # 2 and the only one Stanford has announced
Morgan Shaffer Orange CA
Andrea Gutierrez-Ramos Las Vegas NV
RE: Women's Tennis: Rankings and Preseason Hardware! - ColoradoTree - 01-03-2024
(01-02-2024, 04:33 PM)BobK Wrote: Here are the 2024 commits
Valerie Glozman Bellevue WA Ranked # 2 and the only one Stanford has announced
Morgan Shaffer Orange CA
Andrea Gutierrez-Ramos Las Vegas NV
I wouldn't put a ton of stock in some of the folks listed as "commits" on the tennisrecruiting.com site, especially when they're recruits in a range that are nowhere near our usual levels. Perhaps Shaffer got in on her own and intends to walk on to the program, but she's not close to the level of player where Stanford would offer a scholarship. And it's not clear that Gutierrez-Ramos is even a legitimate prospect at all--her record reflects no high-end results. She could have created a prospect profile on the website and said that she committed to Stanford or that it was her preferred school, but that doesn't mean much.
The site is good for the high-end players like Glozman, and we absolutely sometimes have 4-star and 5-star type walk-ons that are valuable practice players, but we're at the top of the recruiting food chain, and even blue chips come here and never crack the lineup. As neither Shaffer's nor Gutierrez-Ramos's recruiting profile lists a Stanford offer, I think it's safe to assume they never got one.