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Women's Tennis: Utah and Colorado - ColoradoTree - 03-16-2018

Last weekend saw Stanford seem to turn the corner.  To beat UCLA at all, let alone without our top player, Melissa Lord, is just a terrific result.  And to have been in position to sweep USC is similarly good news. USC clearly isn't what they once were (the #1 seed at NCAAs just a few years ago), but we were in the driver's seat of all three remaining matches when it was called, and when good teams play less good teams, you should dominate them.

That successful weekend saw a big jump in the ITA rankings, all the way from #46 up to #25.  Stanford looks to consolidate that good weekend by rolling over two of the weaker teams in the Pac-12, Utah (finished 8th in the conference last year) and Colorado (finished 10th).  The Utah match is today at 1:30pm PT, while the Colorado match is tomorrow at noon. 

Will Lord be back?

That would be lovely.  We won't need her this weekend, but these are the kinds of matches you'd like her to get under her belt so she's in good form when we do start needing her--road visits to Arizona State at the end of March, at the Washington schools in mid-April, and hosting Cal to finish the regular season on April 20th, before the Pac-12 championships the week after that. 

But to answer your question. I have no idea. I'm guessing we'll find out that she's back and healthy when we see her in a doubles lineup, and not much before that.

Utah preview:

Utah isn't a terribly deep team, but it does have talent. Alexia Petrovic was the preseason #98 player, though she's unranked now (and Utah has no other ranked players).  Last year, when these two teams met in the regular season in Salt Lake City, Stanford played without then-#1 Taylor Davidson, who was out with an illness, and won 6-1, with the lone loss coming at #1 with Caroline Doyle losing to Petrovic in a third-set match tiebreaker.  The rematch in the Pac-12 quarterfinals also went Stanford's way, 4-0, with Davidson (now playing #3) beating Petrovic. 

So far this season, Utah is 8-5, and 1-1 in the conference, losing 4-1 to #34 Arizona State but beating Arizona 5-2.  Against ASU, Utah actually took the doubles point before losing at the 2, 4, and 5 positions.  Utah needed the remaining three matches, all of which were in third sets, but lost at #3 to seal the deal.  Against Arizona, they got the win by taking the doubles point and getting singles wins at #1 and also at #4-6.  So, this is a decent team, with strength at the top and the bottom.  That might not present a problem for Gordon at #1, but it could for Yee at #6. Utah is an experienced team, with its six singles players consisting of three seniors, two juniors, and a sophomore. 

But really, this match shouldn't be in any real doubt.

Colorado preview:

Colorado's best player is freshman Linda Huang, who is also the Buffs' lone ranked player at #113. 

The Buffs are having a nice start to the season, going 8-3 with a 1-1 conference mark. All three losses have come to ranked teams, #23 Wichita State, #31 Kansas State, and #34 Arizona State.  In the Pac-12, Colorado beat Arizona 4-3 and then played the Sun Devils tough, falling 4-3. Given that Arizona State is miles better than Arizona, that's a bit surprising.  In both Pac-12 matches, Colorado took the doubles point with lopsided wins at the 1 and 3 spots, lost in singles at #3, #4, and #6, and got singles wins at #2 and #5, with the difference in the two matches being at #1 (Linda Huang won vs. Arizona but lost vs. ASU).

As with Utah, I expect a comprehensive Stanford win.

How to follow:  Live scoring and video here: http://streamingtennis.com/Cardinal/

Pac-12 Standings:

T-1. Stanford (2-0, 6-3 overall)
T-1. Arizona State (2-0, 9-3)
3. Washington State (1-0, 15-1)
T-4. Cal (1-1, 5-5)
T-4. CU (1-1, 8-3)
T-4. Oregon (1-1, 10-4)
T-4. UCLA (1-1, 9-3)
T-4. Utah (1-1, 8-5)
9. UW (0-1, 8-6)
T-10. Arizona (0-2, 8-7)
T-10. USC (0-2, 7-4)

Last week in the Pac-12: Oregon beat UW 5-2 (the strength of both teams is at 1 and 2 singles, and UW won both, but nothing else), but lost a shocker to Wazzu. (Wazzu is now 15-1, but that record is inflated by playing no one good; their lone loss is also the only ranked team (aside from Oregon) that the Cougs have played.) USC lost both in the Bay Area, while UCLA beat Cal after losing to Stanford. Arizona lost at both mountain schools, while Arizona State beat both, albeit not without some struggles, particularly against Colorado. 

Note: these are irrelevant to NCAA seeding, but they do determine the seeding for the Pac-12 championships (and obviously the regular-season conference crown), which can be vital. Last year, Stanford's #1 seed meant they coasted into the final against Cal, whereas Cal was tired from their much tougher road.

ITA Rankings update: 

March 13 team rankings:

Ranked: #25.  Better than #46!

Past opponent watch: 

# 2 Vanderbilt (L)
# 12 Texas (L)
# 15 UCLA (W) 
# 18 Florida (L)
# 47 TCU (W)
NR USC (W)
NR St. Mary's (W)
NR San Jose State (W)
NR UNLV (W)

Cancelled opponent watch:

# 4 Pepperdine

Future opponent watch:

# 20 Oregon
# 35 Washington State
# 37 Arizona State 
# 41 Washington
NR Arizona
NR Cal
NR Colorado
NR Hawaii
NR UCSB
NR Utah

Cal is still out of the rankings after having dropped out entirely last week.  It's been a rough start for them, losing to both USC and UCLA on the road in "non-conference" matches. Cal rebounded nicely against USC last weekend, sweeping them 7-0, but fell again to UCLA, 4-3.

A note on rankings: I'm using the ITA rankings here rather than the new USTA rankings because the ITA rankings control seeding for the NCAA tournament. Still a useful comparison, however, since the USTA rankings are done by committee rather than a computer. Here's a link to those rankings: https://www.usta.com/en/home/stay-current/national/usta-college-tennis-top-25--march-14--2018.html. In the USTA's eyes, we're back in the top 10.

Individual rankings: 

No change since last week (we'll get new rankings next week), but here they are:

Singles:

# 17 Michaela Gordon (season high of #13)
# 33 Emily Arbuthnott (season high of #22)
# 70 Melissa Lord (season high was #7 preseason)
NR Lampl (season high was #51 preseason)
NR Higuchi (season high was #44 preseason)
NR Shin
NR Yee

Doubles:

# 3 Arbuthnott/Gordon (season high of #1)
NR Lord/Lampl (season high of #41)
NR Higuchi/Shin (not yet ranked)
NR Lampl/Yee

Re: Women's Tennis: Utah and Colorado - oldalum - 03-16-2018

great preview as usual! It would be helpful if you could do just one more thing for us tennis fans: arrange for 4 hours of sunshine beginning at about noon. Thanks in advance!

Re: Women's Tennis: Utah and Colorado - ColoradoTree - 03-16-2018

(03-16-2018, 09:07 AM)oldalum link Wrote:  great preview as usual! It would be helpful if you could do just one more thing for us tennis fans: arrange for 4 hours of sunshine beginning at about noon. Thanks in advance!

I can't promise sunshine, but I'll try and hold off on the rain until mid-afternoon, so Lele might want to start this one a touch early, is all I'm saying.

Re: Women's Tennis: Utah and Colorado - ColoradoTree - 03-16-2018

Looks like we won't be seeing Lord today. Gordon/Arbuthnott are warming up on Court 1, Lampl and Yee on Court 2, and Higuchi and Shin on Court 3, with Utah warming up on the back courts. No sign of our once and future #1.

Re: Women's Tennis: Utah and Colorado - ColoradoTree - 03-16-2018

Whoops, and now it's raining. Looks like there should be a few-hour window this afternoon where the rain will stop and the courts could dry, so they should still get the match in today, but it's anyone's guess when it'll actually start (or if they'll just do singles and eschew doubles to make sure the match gets in).

Re: Women's Tennis: Utah and Colorado - ColoradoTree - 03-16-2018

The rain has stopped, the courts have been dried, and they're back out warming up.  Match should get going in just a few minutes. They're starting with singles, so unless something has gone terribly wrong and they're tied 3-3 after singles, it seems unlikely that the doubles point will get decided. 

Re: Women's Tennis: Utah and Colorado - oldalum - 03-16-2018

I think it ended 5-0 [correction: 4-0], with Arbuthnott on 3 a couple of games from a win but didn't play it out.

[Yee was one game away from winning]

Re: Women's Tennis: Utah and Colorado - Spiny_Norman - 03-17-2018

Match today vs. Colorado cancelled by rain. It will not be rescheduled.

Re: Women's Tennis: Utah and Colorado - ColoradoTree - 03-19-2018

(03-16-2018, 04:51 PM)oldalum link Wrote:  I think it ended 5-0 [correction: 4-0], with Arbuthnott on 3 a couple of games from a win but didn't play it out.

[Yee was one game away from winning]

Heck, she was a point away from winning against Utah (serving up 40-15), but Gordon just barely beat her to the punch. 

Frustrating about Colorado. We need every win we can at this point to boost our ranking, and that would have been a win.  Then again, the weather gods have now evened out our rainouts, taking a near-certain loss away from us but also taking away a near-certain win, so it's hard to complain too much.  But as it stands, winning out would give us a final regular season record of 15-3, and three more wins at Pac-12s would get us to 18-3.

Re: Women's Tennis: Utah and Colorado - ColoradoTree - 03-19-2018

A good couple of weeks for the entire team, but especially Gordon and Lampl.  Gordon came back after losing the first set to win 2-6, 6-2, 6-3 over No. 8 (and preseason No. 1) Ena Shibahara of UCLA, steamrolled No. 37 (preseason No. 14) Gabby Smith of USC, 6-1, 6-2, and dispatched preseason No. 98 Alexia Petrovic of Utah with ease, 6-3, 6-1.  And Caroline Lampl is really finding a groove at #2, winning solidly 6-4, 6-2 over No. 41 Jada Hart of UCLA, being just a game away from beating USC's #2, Becca Weissmann, and handling her business against Utah, winning 6-4, 6-0. 

Good to see Emma Higuchi finding her stride as well, beating UCLA's Ayan Broomfield (a Clemson transfer who started this year ranked #52), having her USC match under control, and being the first singles player off the court against Utah, a position we were so used to seeing her fill last season.  And Arbuthnott's lone win in the last three dual matches (she's gone 1-0, though she would have gone 3-0 if they'd played out the matches) was a thrilling three-set match-clincher against No. 104 Terri Fleming of UCLA.

This season is starting to have a 2016 feel to it....