Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - Printable Version
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Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-01-2021
The ITA National Fall Championships start this Thursday and go through Sunday at the Barnes Tennis Center in San Diego. By making the singles finals at Northwest Regionals, Connie Ma and Alexandra Yepifanova earned their spots in that draw, and by winning the doubles tournament with Ma, Angelica Blake will join them in San Diego. And now, apparently the ITA has changed the qualification criteria for Fall Nationals on the fly, further scrapping at-large selections for doubles and just mirroring the singles approach of having the finalists from each region make it to Fall Nationals. That means Niluka Madurawe will make the trip as well and Yepifanova will compete in both singles and doubles. I'd love to see Blake play some added singles matches, but she'd need several more players to drop out to make the draw. It's a loaded field, and it'll be a great opportunity to see where Ma and Yepifanova stack up against some of the best in the country. Hopefully they can at least notch a few wins that will serve them well in the singles rankings--these sorts of tournaments are absolutely massive in getting some quality results that keep your ranking high enough to get into the NCAA singles tournament in the spring.
This will be opposite a Stanford-hosted invitational this weekend where we'll see Choy, Geller, Houghton, Xu, and perhaps Gordon or Mossmer. We don't yet know all the schools participating, but hopefully it's a good enough field to keep that group of players challenged and developing.
No draws yet for either tournament, but at Fall Nationals, a handful of withdrawals has been good news for California-based players. In addition to the two ITA Wild Cards going to UCLA's Abbey Forbes and USC's Salma Ewing, the two alternates who have made the singles main draw now are Mariia Kozyreva from St. Mary's and freshman Snow Han from USC. (Unclear why Han was picked over some others, but she had an unquestionably good regional tournament, beating the 9th and 44th-ranked players in the country as well as the #2 newcomer in ASU's Patricija Spaka before losing to Pepperdine's Lisa Zaar, the ultimate regional winner, in the semis, so presumably an unofficial "live" ITA ranking combined with UTR has her fairly high.) The Han-Ewing doubles pairing also got a wild card, and Cal's Alsola-Richardson pair was selected as an at-large pick. Alsola started out as the 4th alternate in singles and is now up to 2nd. That influx of Pac-12 talent should be useful for those players' rankings, and potentially in turn for Stanford's players when we play them here and in the regular season. Better for us that those spots stay in the Pac-12 rather than continue to boost the SEC and ACC.
Overall, the singles draw has a number of schools with multiple players: USC and North Carolina with 3, and Stanford, UVA, Princeton, and Tennessee each with 2. Schools with two doubles teams in the draw are Stanford, UNC, Iowa State, UVA, and Colorado State (which is a surprise, but then again, the Mountain is the weakest ITA region).
The tournament website for Fall Nationals is here: https://colleges.wearecollegetennis.com/Competitions/ITA/Tournaments/overview/3C0D3BF7-1EA0-4314-9798-02FE691DD86E
Should be live scoring and streaming links before play kicks off on Thursday. As for the Stanford invitational, you can watch it at the usual link: http://streamingtennis.com/Cardinal/?DB_OEM_ID=30600
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-03-2021
The Fall Nationals draws are out, and Connie Ma and Alexandra Yepifanova both face seeds in the first round, though the seeds do not appear related to the preseason rankings and must instead be based on an unpublished interim set of rankings that takes into account regional performance and other fall tournament performance. Here are the seeds:
(1) Abigail Forbes, Jr., UCLA (preseason #2)
(2) Daria Frayman, Jr., Princeton (unranked preseason but has had a good fall)
(3) Sarah Hamner, Fr., South Carolina (#1 newcomer; won All-Americans)
(4) Lisa Zaar, Jr., Pepperdine (preseason #53, but won SW regional in impressive fashion)
(5) Eryn Cayetano, USC (preseason #56 and expected to be USC's #2, but she had an amazing run through qualifying and the main draw into the semis at All-Americans in early October, so that explains the seed)
(6) Alexa Noel, So., Iowa (preseason #12)
(7) Snow Han, Fr., USC (not ranked as a newcomer but had a really impressive regional tournament over some top players)
(8) Ayana Akli, Jr., South Carolina (preseason #29, made the main draw at All-Americans and had a good run in the Carolina regional)
Meanwhile, the preseason #7 and #8 players are unseeded. So, to be clear, the seeded players aren't necessarily the ones that were expected to be the best this year based on body of work, UTR, etc. They've had a good fall where they've gotten some good wins. Stanford (for reasons as yet unknown) decided not to play at All-Americans this year, so that's a ton of good matches that we don't have under our belts. In other words, ignore the seeds--all bets are off in this draw.
Thursday schedule:
Singles Round of 32
9:00am: Ma vs. (7) Snow Han, USC (Han is a redshirt freshman from China and boasts an impressive junior resume)
11:15am: Yepifanova vs. (5) Eryn Cayetano, USC (Cayetano should play #2 for USC this year behind Ewing, so this might be a preview of the regular season, though there was so much movement atop USC's lineup last year that Cayetano might be their #1)
A good day to show whether we'll be better than USC this year, which looks really tough on paper. It's going to be a good year for the top Pac-12 teams, you guys.
Doubles Round of 32
3:00pm: Blake/Ma vs. Collard/Shaikh, UVA
4:30pm: Madurawe/Yepifanova vs. Cross/Rice, Arkansas
Links for live video and scoring aren't up yet, so I'll update this tomorrow once those are available.
Thursday Results:
Singles Round of 32
Ma def. (7) Snow Han (USC) 6-3, 6-1
(5) Eryn Cayetano (USC) def. Yepifanova 7-5, 6-4
Doubles Round of 32
3:00pm: Blake/Ma vs. Collard/Shaikh, UVA
4:30pm: Madurawe/Yepifanova vs. Cross/Rice, Arkansas
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-04-2021
Live streaming here: https://web.track.tennis/events/watch?key=399.vk5Rs5nRINI#/
Live scoring is supposed to be here, but it's not working for me right now: http://scores.tennisticker.de/usa/ita/sb.html?tournid=5083
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - oldalum - 11-04-2021
Ma has started her match, and I noticed a Stanford men's player, Arthur Fery, is playing on the "stadium court".
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Ma takes the first set 6-3! I am impressed by how effortless her swings are, and the accuracy of her placements.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-04-2021
Anyone else dislike these "gameday" pages on the official gostanford website as much as I do? What is the point of them? It gives me no new information that isn't just as accessible from the women's tennis homepage.
Early in the first set, Ma forced a deciding point and Han sprayed it long, so Ma is up an early break, 2-1.
They trade breaks and Ma is up 3-2. Han's great; this will be a fun one. It would be really nice for Ma to consolidate the break here.
Ma holds to consolidate to 4-2 and then gets to deciding point on Han's serve and breaks for 5-2. Then, with the set on Ma's serve, she's quickly broken for 5-3 and she'll try and break for the set. She goes up 0-40 on Han's serve, Han gets it to 30-40, and then Ma wins that point to break for the set, 6-3! She'll serve to start the second shortly.
Ma holds to start the set. Han seemingly frustrated as she hits a double fault and Ma hits a winner to go up 2-0. Ma's serve didn't seem as good as it was at Northwest Regionals to start but she seems to be getting sharper as the match wears on, whereas Han's serve came out hot in the first set and she's really struggling with it now. (Of course, as soon as I say that, she misses three first serves in a row.) But she still holds easily for 3-0. Han seems dispirited. Ma now leads 6-3, 3-0 over the 7th seed.
Yep, Han spiraling now--body language wilting, shoulders slumped after points, lots more unforced errors into the net as she feels the need to make something happen. Straightforward break and consolidation and now she leads 6-3, 5-0, with Han serving to stay in it. Han digs deep and has her best game since early in the first set and she holds. Ma will now serve for the match, up 6-3, 5-1.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-04-2021
Ma holds at love and it's a 6-3, 6-1 win over 7th-seeded Snow Han of USC! That's an upset by seed (and thus by current interim ranking), but not by UTR. If you'd polled the coaches at the match and forced them to pick a winner before the match, I'd bet nearly all would've said Ma. Fall rankings are a question of the opportunities you've had and whether you've capitalized on them. Han has done so before now, to her credit, so she earned that seed. But Ma just hasn't had the same opportunities. She's getting them now.
She'll get the winner of the match between UNC sophomore Fiona Crawley (somehow unseeded here despite her #35 preseason ranking and winning her singles flight at the Carolina Regional to qualify) and LSU junior Safiya Carrington (preseason #96). I would've picked Crawley in straight sets in that one, but it's into the third now with Crawley up a double break, so she could've just been shaking off rust in the first set, as she now leads 3-6, 6-2, 4-1.
Crawley sees it out, 6-1 in the third. Ma vs. Crawley tomorrow will be absolutely outstanding.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-04-2021
Yepifanova-Cayetano now getting started on that stadium court with Cayetano up first. 30-all as Yepifanova brings out that great drop shot of hers and Cayetano doesn't even chase after it. Too good. Yepifanova forces a deciding point and Cayetano sends it wide! Sasha breaks the first game of the match and leads 1-0.
Cayetano breaks back for 1-1, but Yepifanova has a dominant return game and breaks again for a 2-1 lead.
They trade some straightforward holds of serve and Sasha leads 3-2, still up a break.
Cayetano breaks for 3-3, and on her serve, Yepifanova gets it to a deciding point and breaks for a 4-3 lead. Yepifanova has shown some emotion early and has been more expressive than we saw in Northwest Regionals. Can she come out and consolidate that break?
She cannot. Cayetano takes deciding point for 4-4 and then holds easily for 5-4. Yepifanova seems visibly frustrated to me; hopefully Frankie Brennan can calm her down here and she can deliver a good service game to extend the set.
It was a great service game and it's 5-5. But Cayetano answers back with one of her own, and Sasha will serve down 5-6 to force a tiebreak. This is much more tentative tennis from Sasha than we saw at Northwest Regionals.
She goes down early but gets it back to yet another deciding point. She sprays a backhand well wide despite having time, and Cayetano takes the first set 7-5. Cayetano is playing well, and Sasha isn't playing her best. Plenty of time to get it figured out, though.
Sasha forces a deciding point on Cayetano's serve to open the second set and takes it on a double fault. Leads 1-0 in the second, down a set but up a break. Then a strong service game to hold for 2-0, before a Cayetano ace on deciding point makes it 2-1.
Ugh. Cayetano now up 3-2 in the second. Sasha has now been up a break four times and has given the lead back each time. Sigh. You rarely win playing tight, tentative tennis, folks. Cayetano has been on the front foot all match long, with Yepifanova seemingly content to play defensively. Seemingly lacking the confidence in her shots to go down the line like she did in her big win over Wong.
But she's not going away! Holds for 3-3 and then breaks Cayetano to go back up a break, 4-3. Can she consolidate the break this time?!
Narrator: she could not. Three backhands into the net and it's 4-4. Sasha's serve has been ok, but that backhand has been rough. Cayetano has it relatively easy on her serve, moving Sasha around, and it's now a 7-5, 5-4 lead for Cayetano. Again, Yepifanova will serve to stay in a set that she once led by a break at least twice.
Sigh. On yet another deciding point, Cayetano moves Sasha all over the court and it's a 7-5, 6-4 win over Yepifanova. Doubles next. The silver lining, I suppose, is that Cayetano might be USC's #1, she played well, Sasha didn't, and it was still very close.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-04-2021
In the consolation bracket tomorrow, Yepifanova gets UNC's Cameron Morra, their likely #1, a four-time All-American, and the preseason #32 player. No biggie.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - Lorcan - 11-04-2021
It looks like Connie Ma and Angelica Blake just won their doubles match against UVA in a super tiebreak, Crawley and Scotty from UNC, the four seeds, are likely next.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-04-2021
Yep, Ma/Blake beat Collard/Shaikh in a match tiebreaker for the third set! The match tiebreaker was 10-5, and I know they won the first set 6-3, but the scoring site is down, so I don't know the second set score.
Madurawe/Yepifanova should be playing now, but I can't seem to find their court. The live streaming link apparently doesn't have all courts, and with the live scoring down, we're adrift.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-04-2021
Madurawe/Yepifanova fall short, 3-6, 6-7, and they’re into the consolation bracket.
Blake/Ma’s scoreline was 6-3, 2-6, 10-5 in the end.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-04-2021
Fall Nationals Friday Schedule:
9:00am: Ma vs. #35 Fiona Crawley (UNC) (Round of 16); if Ma wins, the quarterfinal, likely against 2nd-seeded Daria Frayman of Princeton, will be at 2:45pm
* Yepifanova would’ve played Cameron Morra (UNC) at 11:45am, but Morra withdrew due to injury. That’s a bummer—injury walkovers don’t count as wins in the rankings, but in any event, Yepifanova is through to the consolation quarterfinals.
2:45pm: Ma in quarterfinals if she wins in R16
4:30pm: Yepifanova vs. TBD (consolation quarterfinals)
7:00pm: Blake/Ma vs. (4) Crawley/Scotty (UNC) (doubles R16)
8:30pm: Madurawe/Yepifanova vs. Lewis/Pietrowicz (Michigan State) (consolation R16)
Meanwhile, Stanford hosts Princeton, UCSB, and USF for some invitational matches starting tomorrow. Precisely what the matchups are and when they’re played remains a secret because, uh, reasons, maybe.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-05-2021
Ma's match getting started on Court 9 now!
Early 2-0 lead for Crawley. Time to wake up, Connie!
Ma breaks back for 2-1 and it's back on serve. She then holds for 2-2 before Crawley holds for a 3-2 lead. On serve. Crawley is painting corners beautifully and really working the lines, whereas Ma seems to be making more unforced errors than usual and her first serve is missing too often. Seems to be a depth issue--she's sailing shots long rather than into the net. But I expected this to be a heavyweight bout, so let's hope Connie tightens things up.
Crawley breaks for 4-2, Ma gets to a deciding point on Crawley's serve, and wins it to get back to 4-3, on serve (which is a less meaningful status when you've been broken twice in three service games). Connie is hanging in there, but no question Crawley looks sharper and is generally the aggressor here. I don't think this will turn around for Connie unless she starts dictating points a bit more.
Well, uh, she did that! A really sharp service game and she holds at love for 4-4. Big-time game right here coming up....
Well, that was different! Ma breaks Crawley at love, attacking every single service return, and she's up 5-4 and will serve for the first set next. A different player these last couple of games.
Sigh, it didn't last. Broken at love and it's 5-5. Then a quick Crawley hold and Ma will serve to force a tiebreaker. She does so, though it takes a deciding point to do it! A tiebreaker it is.
Ma up 2-1 so far, on serve in the tiebreaker.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - Lorcan - 11-05-2021
*refreshes frantically for fabulous updates*
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-05-2021
Ma up 4-2 as they change ends, and she'll now serve up 5-4, with the set on her racquet right here.
She wins both points and takes the first set 7-6 (7-4)! That wasn't Connie Ma at her most skillful, but it was a great display of grit. Crawley is playing well, and Ma is like a pitcher finding a way to get outs without her best stuff.
Ma comes out more aggressively to start the second set and holds with ease for a 7-6, 1-0 lead. Now Crawley's looking a bit nervous. Ma had a good chance to break but dumped it into the net and then sailed a forehand long on deciding point. Ugh, that could've really put Crawley in a desperate situation, but now it's 1-1. Winning that game seems to have put a charge in Crawley, who didn't look at her best the first two games of the set, making more errors than she had in the first. Crawley breaks Ma for a 2-1 lead. Looked like Ma hit the line on deciding point there, but Crawley called it wide and the chair umpire was looking right at it, so it was probably just wide.
Ma breaks back for 2-2! But she struggles again in her next service game--still having trouble locating that first serve, and Crawley is taking advantage of the second serves. Unforced errors starting to creep back in, too. Crawley breaks for a 3-2 lead.
Ma fights to a deciding point and takes it to break back again! 3-3 with Ma serving now. Can she get back on the horse and hold here?
Narrator: she could not. Crawley yet again up a break, 4-3. Can Connie summon the same late-set improved form she found in the first?
Of course, Ma then breaks at love and it's 4-4 again. Weird match, this one. Crawley seemed to get tight there. Now can Ma hold serve?! It would be a good time to start finding that first serve again!
*slams head on desk* Ma is broken at love and Crawley will serve for the second set next, up 5-4. Crawley holds for a 6-4 set win and we'll play three. Hopefully we finally see Ma at her best in the third, because we haven't seen it yet, that's for sure.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-05-2021
Moving to the third set, Ma holds to start things off. Can she step up the pressure on Crawley here with an early break? She was on the verge of that last set but couldn't finish, and then the set got away from her after that.
Ma leads 7-6, 4-6, 1-0
I had to take a work call, so I have no idea where things stand now because the scoring app is again failing to update. They have to do better.
Score now says she's up 5-1 in the third! And listening in confirms that she just had the match on her racquet on deciding point, but Crawley broke to stay alive. Ma leads 5-2 in the third. Just four more points, Connie!
Up 15-30 now on Crawley's serve.... Two more points!
Now one more point! 15-40.... She then sends a return long, and it's 30-40.
And that's it! Ma beats an excellent Fiona Crawley 7-6, 4-6, 6-2.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - magnus - 11-05-2021
Exciting. Tuned in the last half of the third set.
Was watching with her at the far end and it seems like she plays very matter of fact. No wasted energy, not much emotion. Don't get me wrong, she made some pretty impressive shots and saves, but it's hard to get a gauge of her energy/excitement level from her play (or maybe that's just because the view from a tiny screen misses that detail.
Onward!
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-05-2021
With that win, Ma advances to play 2nd-seeded Daria Frayman of Princeton in the quarterfinals at 2:45pm this afternoon.
Frayman had a bit of an easier time in her R16 match, beating Tennessee's Rebeka Mertena (the preseason #55 player) 6-0, 7-6. Frayman has been something of a surprise so far this fall--she played well her freshman year in the truncated spring 2020 season (beating USC's Salma Ewing was a highlight) and ended the year ranked #109, but with no season for Princeton last year, it wasn't clear what to expect this year. Well, she's made quite a jump and has a number of ranked wins already this fall: over #9 Natasha Subhash (UVA) 6-3, 6-2 at a September invitational, over #32 Cameron Morra (UNC) in three and #119 Jaeda Daniel of NC State (who is better than that ranking) in straights at the same event. She then won the Northeast regional title over her teammate, highly-regarded freshman Victoria Hu and beat #20 Valeriya Zeleva of UCF at another fall invitational. And that's not to mention dispatching highly touted UVA freshman Elaine Chervinsky 6-1, 6-2 in the first round here and getting past Mertena.
(11-05-2021, 12:01 PM)magnus Wrote: Exciting. Tuned in the last half of the third set.
Was watching with her at the far end and it seems like she plays very matter of fact. No wasted energy, not much emotion. Don't get me wrong, she made some pretty impressive shots and saves, but it's hard to get a gauge of her energy/excitement level from her play (or maybe that's just because the view from a tiny screen misses that detail.
Onward!
You picked the right time to tune in! And agreed--she stays very level, regardless of how well or poorly she's playing. She's not, say, Caroline Lampl out there pumping her fist and shouting after key points. But she also doesn't seem to get down on herself like Arbuthnott (or Shin) would. Sometimes when she was trailing and would miss a shot, Arbuthnott would just walk slumped-over, looking like Eeyore out there. Ma is just even keel, the whole time. Gordon is often like that, too, though you see a bit more emotion from her, positive and negative, than you do from Ma. Now she'll get a couple hours of rest and icing her legs before she has to go again. Then doubles tonight.
In other results from Fall Nationals, SMC's Mariia Kozyreva knocked off top seed and 2nd-ranked Abbey Forbes of UCLA, which will boost Kozyreva's ranking by a fair bit, which will in turn boost Ma's ranking on account of beating her at Northwest Regionals. Kozyreva gets USC's Cayetano next, who followed up her win over Yepifanova with a straight sets win over FSU's Petra Hule, who will likely play #2 for the Seminoles this year. The higher-ranked Cayetano gets, the less Yepifanova's loss to her costs her, and the higher Kozyreva gets, the greater the boost for Ma's ranking, so either result gets us some value, but it's a lot easier to root for Kozyreva than literally anyone from USC.
Anyway, the courts at Taube are dry but no one seems to be playing on them, so not sure what the plans for this invitational are.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - ColoradoTree - 11-05-2021
Ma's quarterfinal is on now. Just a heads up that I won't be able to follow it closely. She held easily to kick things off. This is my first time watching Frayman play, and not only is she a loud player--grunting on every serve and ground stroke--she doesn't look great in the way that Crawley looked great. But she's very consistent. Seems unlikely to beat herself. Anyway, she holds at love despite not having a terribly strong serve because Ma was pushing the envelope on returns and going for winners. But then Ma came back and held at love for a 2-1 lead, and then Frayman held again at love for 2-2. Frayman forced deciding point on Ma's serve, but Connie took it to stay on serve, up 3-2.
I think Connie will find that she can be more patient on rallies on Frayman's serve and the opportunities will come. She seems to be trying to end points early and going a bit too aggressively. Her instincts to work angles is the right one--Frayman doesn't strike me as quite as agile as Fiona Crawley--but she might not need to be as aggressive as she's being now.
Frankly, no way I could listen to this whole match--I don't mind exertion-related grunts, but Frayman's are distractingly loud.
Ma breaks for 4-2 but gives it right back, and then Frayman holds for 4-4.
RE: Women's Tennis: Fall Nationals/Stanford Invitational - magnus - 11-05-2021
Ma lost 4-6,4-6.
Grabbed from the tracker page