NCAA Championship Women's Tennis: National Champions!!!

NCAA Championship Women's Tennis: National Champions!!! - Printable Version

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Women's Tennis: National Champions!!! - ColoradoTree - 05-13-2019

We're down to the final eight teams, with the quarterfinals on Friday, the semifinals on Saturday, and the championship match on Sunday. Because of the tight timeframe, I figured one big thread makes more sense than a thread for each match.

Up first is 3rd-seeded Stanford's quarterfinal match against 6th-seeded Pepperdine, currently scheduled for 11am on Friday at the USTA National Campus near Orlando, Florida. (I say currently scheduled for two reasons. First, the new NCAA TV deal with the Tennis Channel means we might see schedules adjusted to maximize airtime within certain windows. And second, it wouldn't be the NCAA championships if matches didn't get postponed due to rain.)

How Stanford got here

Stanford (25-1, 10-0 Pac-12) suffered just one loss in the regular season (4-3 to top overall seed Georgia), went undefeated in Pac-12 play, and won the conference tournament to secure the #3 overall seed in the 64-team tournament. Stanford got an easy 4-0 win over New Mexico State in the first round and a relatively routine 4-1 win over #31 Syracuse to book its spot in the super regional, where it got pushed to the limit by #14 Kansas, ultimately winning 4-3.

How Pepperdine got here

Pepperdine (24-3, 9-0 WCC) also went undefeated in conference play, and racked up enough quality non-conference wins to make up for a weak WCC schedule and get itself a top 8 seed. In the regular season, it lost 4-1 to 5th seed Duke at Indoor Nationals, 4-3 to Cal in Malibu in a bit of a shocker, and 4-0 at Michigan. But it also beat UCLA twice, 4-0 at home and 4-3 on the road, it beat Texas 5-2 in Austin, and Northwestern 5-2 in Evanston. The Waves breezed past Fairfield in the first round, avenged the Cal loss by beating Cal 4-0 in the second round, and then fended off #23 UCF 4-2 in a match that was in the balance until the very end, with Pepperdine leading 3-2 as two matches started third sets.

Comparing the teams

No head-to-head result, but we have several common opponents:

* Syracuse (Pepperdine won 4-3, Stanford won 4-1)
* Cal (Pepperdine lost 4-3 (home, regular season) and won 4-0 (home, NCAAs); Stanford won 6-1 (away))
* UCLA (Pepperdine won 4-0 (home) and 4-3 (away); Stanford won 4-3 (away) and 4-2 (Pac-12s))
* Texas (Pepperdine won 5-2 (away); Stanford won 4-3 (neutral))
* St. Mary's (Pepperdine won 4-0; Stanford won 4-0)
* USC (Pepperdine won 4-1 (away); Stanford won 4-3 (away))
* Santa Clara (Pepperdine won 4-1; Stanford won 6-1)

From a UTR perspective, Stanford has an advantage. Looking at the Power 6 (the aggregate UTRs of the anticipated lineup), Stanford has 68.31 and Pepperdine has 67.01. Here's how UTR sees the individual matches:

1. Gordon up 0.12 (Gordon beat #37 Lahey 6-4, 6-2 at the USTA Blizzard Wild Card Challenge back in December)
2. Lord up 0.16
3. Lampl up 0.54
4. Arbuthnott up 0.63
5. Shin up 0.40
6. Madurawe down 0.35; Higuchi down 0.55 (Pepperdine's #6, Anastasia Iamachkine, has the team's 3rd-highest UTR and best dual-match record, so you can't put the deficit here completely on Higuchi's struggles)

So, three pretty sizable advantages, two slight ones, and one big deficit. In doubles, the #1 team has a 9-6 dual match record, the #2 team has an 11-2 record, and the #3 team has a 15-3 record. And they lost doubles against UCF, with UCF winning #2 narrowly and #3 handily while Pepperdine won big on #1. So winning the doubles point should certainly be on the table. Earlier this year, Lampl/Yee lost 6-4 to Pepperdine's Failla/Iamachkine, the pair they'll face on Friday, so hopefully they can figure out a way to turn that around. If Stanford can take the doubles point, they'd have to feel pretty good about their chances to win three singles matches.

Lineups

Doubles

1. #19 Lampl/Yee (10-6 regular-season dual record) vs. #41 Failla/Iamachkine (9-6)
2. #29 Arbuthnott/Gordon (13-2) vs. #86 Lahey/Kuczer (11-2)
3. #57 Lord/Madurawe (16-4) vs. Milovanovic/Lekaj (15-3)

Singles

1. #24 Gordon (13-4) vs. #37 Ashley Lahey (12-4)
2. #29 Lord (16-3) vs. #102 Adrijana Lekaj (13-6)
3. #66 Lampl (18-0) vs. #53 Jessica Failla (9-3; Failla used to be USC's #1 before transferring)
4. #44 Arbuthnott (17-2) vs. Dzina Milovanovic (11-3)
5. #108 Shin (15-3) vs. Daria Kuczer (9-2)
6. #107 Higuchi (13-4) vs. Anastasia Iamachkine (14-1)

Analysis

Pepperdine is an outstanding team, but it was considerably weakened by the mid-season departure of Evgeniya Levashova, who hasn't played for Pepperdine since the loss to Cal in mid-February but who is still ranked #16 in the singles rankings based on the strength of her fall tournament season. (FYI, the super regional match against UCF must have had a little extra juice, since Levashova is transferring... to UCF.) That's meant that several players are playing a line higher than they would otherwise. That said, Pepperdine beat UCLA twice and Texas on the road with this lineup, so they're still very dangerous.

They're good in doubles, but not dominant like Kansas had been; the Waves lost the doubles point six times (Duke, Cal, Michigan, UCSB, UCLA, and in the last match to UCF). And if we take doubles, UTR likes our chances to pull out a win with the doubles point and wins at #3, #4, and #5. Shin has had her drops in form this year, but to shake off losing the first set against Kansas and ultimately take the third set 6-2, knowing it was all riding on her--that can't help but give her a big boost of confidence. Given the importance of the moment, I expect the Gordon-Lahey match to be more competitive than when Gordon beat her 6-4, 6-2 at the USTA Blizzard Wild Card Challenge, and I wouldn't be surprised at all to see Gordon or Lord score a win. I'll predict that we take the doubles point and get a straight set win from Arbuthnott, we lose at #6, and the three matches on 1, 2, 3, and 5 go to third sets, but we get the first two of the four to go final. I'll say a 4-1 win that is a lot closer than the final scoreline suggests. But Pepperdine is absolutely good enough to beat us, and I wouldn't be shocked if they pull out a close win. (Perhaps I'm not giving Lampl enough credit, or giving Failla too much credit, but I've seen how good she can be, so I'm having trouble sticking with UTR's perception of Lampl as a strong favorite. I think Lampl wins in the end, but Failla really pushes her.)

How to watch:

It might be on the Tennis Channel, but if not, you should be able to follow along with live video and scoring on the USTA's website: https://www.ustanationalcampus.com/en/home/watch.html

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - oldalum - 05-13-2019

(05-13-2019, 11:12 AM)ColoradoTree Wrote: Stanford's quarterfinal match against 6th-seeded Pepperdine, currently scheduled for 10am on Friday

do you mean 11:00 am?

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - ColoradoTree - 05-13-2019

Quarterfinal Schedule:

Friday, May 17th (all times Pacific):

9:00am: (2) UNC vs. (7) UCLA
11:00am: (3) Stanford vs. (6) Pepperdine
2:00pm: (1) Georgia vs. (8) Vanderbilt
4:00pm: (4) South Carolina vs. (5) Duke

And here's how UTR sees those other three quarterfinals:

UNC vs. UCLA: UNC is a big favorite at #3 and #4 and a slight favorite at #1, while the matches at #2, #5, and #6 are toss-ups. Also, as good as UCLA always is in doubles, UNC hasn't lost the doubles point yet this year.

Georgia vs. Vanderbilt: UGA is a big favorite at #4 and #6 and a moderate favorite at #1, #3, and #5, while Vanderbilt is a slight favorite at #2. Georgia won both meetings between the teams this year, with the Bulldogs winning 4-3 at Indoor Nationals (UGA lost doubles and #2 and #4 singles, but won on 1, 3, 5, and 6) and 4-1 in Athens in the regular season (UGA won doubles, lost #2 singles, but won on 1, 3, and 4, with 5 and 6 just having started due to limited indoor courts).

Duke vs. South Carolina: Duke is a big favorite at #6, a moderate favorite on #5 and a slight favorite at #3, while South Carolina is a moderate favorite at #4. The matches on #1 and #2 are toss-ups.

If Stanford beats Pepperdine, we'll get the UNC-UCLA winner in the semifinals on Saturday. Both are tough matchups, but at least we know we can beat UCLA because we've done it twice already, albeit in close matches. UNC is a scary matchup because they're so good in doubles, so you go in assuming you'll need four singles wins, and the top 4 in that lineup is just so tough. As far as UTR is concerned, all the matches are basically toss-ups. If Higuchi plays, the biggest advantage is UNC's Morra over Arbuthnott (0.11, which is tiny). If it's Madurawe at #6, she'd have a 0.12 advantage over UNC's Alle Sanford.

(05-13-2019, 12:43 PM)oldalum Wrote:
(05-13-2019, 11:12 AM)ColoradoTree Wrote: Stanford's quarterfinal match against 6th-seeded Pepperdine, currently scheduled for 10am on Friday
do you mean 11:00 am?

Whoops, fixed!

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - ColoradoTree - 05-15-2019

* Here's the College Tennis Today preview of the quarterfinals, including Bobby's prediction that also thinks Stanford wins 4-1 (behind the doubles point and singles wins from Lord, Lampl, and Arbuthnott): https://www.collegetennistoday.com/item/1844-ncaa-women-s-quarterfinal-previews.html. He also picks Georgia to beat Vanderbilt 4-2 (splitting the difference between UGA's 4-1 and 4-3 wins earlier this season), Duke to beat South Carolina 4-3, and UNC to beat UCLA 4-1, which would set up Stanford-UNC and Georgia-Duke semifinals on Saturday.

He's got updated UTR information, taking into account the last match, but it doesn't change much:

1. Gordon up 0.13 instead of 0.12
2. Lord up 0.13 instead of 0.16
3. Lampl up 0.57 instead of 0.54
4. Arbuthnott up 0.66 instead of 0.63
5. Shin up 0.43 instead of 0.40
6. Madurawe down 0.43 instead of 0.35; Higuchi down 0.56 instead of 0.55

The bottom line is that we're favored narrowly at 1 and 2, favored strongly at 3, 4, and 5, and we should expect a loss at 6.

* Here's a link to the USTA's championships website, which includes the schedule and a link to live video: https://www.ustanationalcampus.com/en/home/collegiate/ncaa-championships.html

* The USTA did features on various contenders in the leadup to NCAAs, and here's the one they did on Stanford back in March: https://www.usta.com/en/home/stay-current/national/road-to-orlando--stanford-women-.html

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - ColoradoTree - 05-15-2019

Some video from the USTA of Stanford and Pepperdine getting in some practice, in case you want to do some scouting!

[twitter]https://twitter.com/usta/status/1128684702393483265[/twitter]

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - oldalum - 05-15-2019

why does it say UCF there? Is that where UCF plays?

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - ColoradoTree - 05-16-2019

(05-15-2019, 04:00 PM)oldalum Wrote: why does it say UCF there? Is that where UCF plays?

Yep. It's the USTA National Campus, but because it's in Orlando, they struck a deal with UCF for the Knights to use the complex as their home courts, and some of UCF's matches against marquee opponents get televised on the Tennis Channel (previously they were on ESPN3) as part of the "College MatchDay" show, more frequently than their ranking would warrant. The complex also hosts some neutral site matches--our women's team played Oklahoma State there in a rematch of the previous year's NCAA championship match in 2017 before we traveled onto Gainesville to play Florida, and the Oklahoma State match was televised on ESPN3.

The exposure is great for UCF tennis, but the location is a downside--UCF's main campus is about a 30-minute drive from the facility, so I'm not sure the kind of home court advantage they get. The campus is near the Orlando airport, SSE of downtown, while the campus is ENE of downtown.

The collegiate part of the complex looks pretty neat, with 12 courts (6 on each side of a center walkway with bleachers looking down on each side), so they can host two dual matches at the same time, which is essential to hosting nationals. Six indoor courts, too, so they can handle inclement weather reasonably well (whether they play one match out fully or do two matches simultaneously with the doubles point and then starting three singles matches each).

FYI, the men's quarterfinals are starting now, and here are some thoughts, since it'll be the same setup for the Stanford match tomorrow:

1. The bugs flying around the camera make the video darn near unwatchable. It feels like the match is taking place in the middle of the plague of locusts.

2. The video and live scoring are on separate pages, so you won't know what the score is unless you have a second window open with the live scoring.

3. It is annoying for the viewer when both teams wear all-white outfits like they're playing Wimbledon. (I had the same frustration with the Stanford and Kansas outfits last Friday.)

4. If you've got nothing else to do today, this matchup of the last two teams to win NCAAs on the men's side (Wake Forest last year, UVA the three years before that) should be great tennis.

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - Spiny_Norman - 05-16-2019

(05-16-2019, 09:37 AM)ColoradoTree Wrote: 1. The bugs flying around the camera make the video darn near unwatchable. It feels like the match is taking place in the middle of the plague of locusts.

[twitter]https://twitter.com/CBrueyWFTV/status/1129039120171450369[/twitter]

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - ColoradoTree - 05-16-2019

The rest of the men's quarters will be on Tennis Channel, in case you want to tune in and get a sense of what that coverage will be like. But you won't see Stanford on there unless we make the final, as our match tomorrow won't be one of the televised ones, and neither would our semifinal against UNC/UCLA if we beat Pepperdine. The Tennis Channel coverage is of the top half of the bracket on the women's side, but it's split on the men's side for whatever reason:

All team matches:
Televised matches in bold

Thursday (men's quarters):

9:00am: (4) Wake Forest vs. (5) Virginia
11:00am: (2) Texas vs. (10) TCU
2:00pm: (1) Ohio State vs. (9) UNC
NB 4:00pm: (3) Florida vs. (6) Baylor

Friday (women's quarters)

9:00am: (2) UNC vs. (7) UCLA
11:00am: (3) Stanford vs. (6) Pepperdine
2:00pm: (1) Georgia vs. (8) Vanderbilt
NB 4:00pm: (4) South Carolina vs. (5) Duke

Saturday (semifinals)

9:00am: Men's Semi #1 (this would be TEX vs. FLA/BAY)
11:00am: Women's Semi #1 (this would be STAN/PEPP vs. UNC/UCLA)
1:00pm: Men's Semi #2 (this would be WAKE vs. OSU/UNC)
NB 3:00pm: Women's Semi #2 (UGA/VANDY vs. SCAR/DUKE)

Sunday (finals)

12:00pm: Men's Team Final
NB 2:00pm: Women's Team Final

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - oldalum - 05-16-2019

I've never understood why they schedule these matches 2 hours apart. They will rarely be done in 2 hours. I hope they are planning to use 12 of the 100+ courts available at the site. And if they're going to do that, why not schedule them in 2 waves of 2 matches each, separated by enough time for the refs to recover?

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - ColoradoTree - 05-17-2019

Emily Arbuthnott continues to crush it in the classroom, headlining the Pac-12 All-Academic First Team with a 4.14 GPA as an Economics major. All the rest of our eligible* student-athletes were Honorable Mention selections--Shin, Higuchi, Gordon, Lampl, and Lord.

https://pac-12.com/article/2019/05/10/pac-12-announces-mens-and-womens-tennis-2019-all-academic-teams
https://gostanford.com/news/2019/5/14/womens-tennis-pac-12-all-academic-honors.aspx

Interestingly, the Pac-12 release doesn't mention the GPAs of the Honorable Mention picks, but the Stanford release does. (The Stanford release notes that Higuchi has a 3.42 in HumBio, Lampl has a 3.34 in in STS, and Lord has a 3.24 in Public Policy. Shin (3.44) and Gordon (3.38) are as yet undeclared. Seems weirdly invasive that we should now know these things, really. Sure, trumpet the First Team folks, I guess, but do I really need to know everyone's GPA? I prefer the Pac-12's approach, which was to give the GPAs and majors of the First and Second team, but then just list the Honorable Mention folks.)

* To be eligible, you have to be at least a sophomore, maintain a 3.0 GPA, and play in at least 50 percent of the team's matches. From looking at the selections, I don't see anyone that plays doubles but not singles, like Kimberly Yee, so I can't be sure whether those folks were deemed not to have played in 50% of the team matches because they didn't play singles, or if those doubles-only folks fell short on the GPA front.

(05-16-2019, 06:14 PM)oldalum Wrote: I've never understood why they schedule these matches 2 hours apart. They will rarely be done in 2 hours. I hope they are planning to use 12 of the 100+ courts available at the site. And if they're going to do that, why not schedule them in 2 waves of 2 matches each, separated by enough time for the refs to recover?

The answer is "sort of." Yes, they're going to use 12 courts, albeit not equally. The 1st, 3rd, and 4th quarterfinals will be on Courts 1 through 6, while the 2nd quarterfinal (ours) will be on Courts 7-12. If the Tennis Channel weren't involved, they'd use both sets of courts equally, but it would make sense to me if TV is just set up for one set of courts for cost/simplicity's sake. I don't think they expect the 3rd quarterfinal to finish within 2 hours, but the "not before" scheduling format ensures the last teams are ready to go in case it does, so they don't have a lot of airtime they have to fill between matches--they want to get that second televised match on as soon as they an after the first. I'm assuming that South Carolina and Duke will watch Georgia-Vanderbilt closely enough to know when they need to start warming up, and then they'll probably do that on 7-12.

And as for the 100+ courts on the site, the 12 they have set up for college tennis (with bleachers, a scoreboard, live streaming capability, and a little more space between the courts) are off to the side from the rest of the site. You could find scattered courts around the rest of the grounds if you needed to, but you wouldn't have bleachers for fans, the atmosphere would be isolated and wouldn't lend itself well to coaching, and you wouldn't have a scoreboard, so you'd be playing blind to what the rest of your teammates were doing. (And we wouldn't know what's going on, either, unless they had a runner to come update the scores after each game.)

Assuming it works like yesterday, the first match will still be going on when the second match starts up, with a second set of officials. Then the second quarterfinal might be done when the third quarterfinal starts, so you'd have to use that first set of officials again just in case the second quarter isn't done yet. I don't know how they're splitting up chair umpire assignments, but I assume the ones who work the second quarterfinal would then work the fourth so each set gets two matches.

So, really, you end up with the following schedule on Courts 1-6, which is a lot more sensible (assuming the officials that worked the second quarterfinal on 7-12 slide over to 1-6 for the last one):

9:00am: (2) UNC vs. (7) UCLA
2:00pm: (1) Georgia vs. (8) Vanderbilt
NB 4:00pm: (4) South Carolina vs. (5) Duke

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - oldalum - 05-17-2019

from the scoreboard it looks like we're going with Higuchi at #6 today

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - ColoradoTree - 05-17-2019

UNC and UCLA getting started now. Here's the live stats link if you're interested: http://ncaachampstennis.smtinternetservices.com/srd/?ucla-ca-w_vs_unc-nc-w

And here's the live video: https://www.ustanationalcampus.com/en/home/watch.html

Recall that as great as UCLA has been in doubles, UNC hasn't lost the doubles point yet this season. Right now, UNC is up a break on Courts 1 (4-1) and 3 (3-2), while UCLA is up a break on #2 (4-1). In singles, UNC is favored by a lot on #3 and #4 and by a little on #1, while the other three courts are toss-ups. So a UCLA upset would seem to require taking doubles and then winning the toss-ups. Four singles wins is possible, but it's asking an awful lot.

If we get past Pepperdine (who legit terrifies me, as do most teams remaining), UCLA would be a much better matchup for us. Against UCLA, we'd be big favorites on #3 and #4, a slight favorite on #1, a slight/moderate underdog on #6 depending on who plays, and #2 and #5 would be toss-ups, even though it'd be another Shin-Altick rematch, which haven't gone our way. Against UNC, every single court in singles would be a toss-up. Sure, we wouldn't run the risk of losing to UCLA, which is a silver lining, I suppose, but 6 toss-ups is the kind of match that will put me into an early grave.

(05-17-2019, 09:15 AM)oldalum Wrote: from the scoreboard it looks like we're going with Higuchi at #6 today

I don't know if it's the right move (I can envision both Higuchi and Madurawe beating and losing to Iamachkine), but I'm cool with it, assuming she really is in the lineup today and they didn't just preload the scoreboard with our standard lineup. She's proven her worth on this stage before (8-2 all-time in NCAA team play; she was All-Tournament Team at #6 singles last year), and I don't know that Madurawe is any likelier to beat Iamachkine than Higuchi is. Since Iamachkine is a freshman, maybe Higuchi's experience can help her get the job done.

It's crunch time, after all. We know Emma has the ability to dominate in NCAA play, and we don't know that about Madurawe yet, so why not?

UCLA won 6-1 at #2 doubles, but UNC still has the edge on #1 and #3. At #1, UCLA will serve to stay in it, down 2-5. At #3, UNC will serve for that match, up 5-4.

UCLA holds for 3-5 on #1, but UNC promptly serves it out at love to win that court 6-3. But! Over at #3 doubles, UCLA broke UNC's serve to knot it at 5-5, and then held for 6-5, so UNC will now serve to force a tiebreaker that would decide the doubles point.

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - ColoradoTree - 05-17-2019

It's still a long road for UCLA to pull off the upset, but it just got shorter, as they won a barnburner of a tiebreaker on #3 (8-6) to win the doubles point--UNC loses the doubles point for the very first time this year.

FWIW, I'd give UNC's Jones a bigger edge over Hart than UTR would suggest, and I don't think UNC has much trouble in taking Courts 1, 3, and 4. But can UCLA win on 2, 5, and 6? I still think UNC should be considered a solid favorite to win this match, but let's see how the first sets go on 2, 5, and 6 in particular.

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - oldalum - 05-17-2019

let's hope that flummoxes UNC for the singles! [unfortunately 4 UCLA players lost their first service game--not a good sign]

If Higuchi is still the most fit of all our players, that could be an edge for her over Madurawe (and her opponent) given the playing conditions today.

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - BobK - 05-17-2019

The Stanford match just started

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - cardfan77 - 05-17-2019

is the scoreboard working for anyone?

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - BobK - 05-17-2019

I lost it also

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - StanfordMatt - 05-17-2019

With the scoreboard down, @StanfordWTennis looks to be the best source for updates. #1 dubs lost and #2 is down 5-2.

RE: Women's Tennis: Team Finals - oldalum - 05-17-2019

scoreboard is working for me now. We lost doubles at #1 and 2, we were leading 6-5 but on serve on #3. No surprise, got to get the job done in singles.

UNC beats UCLA 4-1 with dominant 2-set singles wins on courts 2,3,4, and 6. UCLA's Altick was one point away from winning a close 2-setter on #5, and Hart/Jones had split sets on court 1.