03-25-2019, 09:41 AM
(This post was last modified: 03-25-2019, 10:01 AM by ColoradoTree.)
Yeah, I didn't do a separate post for the Hawaii and UC Davis matches this week because it didn't feel like any of the results would be very newsworthy, but Lampl getting a shot at #1 singles is certainly newsworthy!
Like oldalum, I don't actually know what was behind it, and we may never know, unless someone asks Lele after the season in an unguarded moment. And I completely agree that the fact that (1) she's a senior, and (2) she's been playing absolutely lights out played a role in it.
But yes, under the ITA Rulebook for this season, the one-line rule is still in effect, and unless I'm missing something, putting Lampl at #1 was a violation of it. You can download it here (see pages 4-5):
https://www.itatennis.com/ITA/Coaches/Rules.aspx
The key excerpt:
Because the lineup against Arizona was Lord-Gordon-Lampl, it was therefore an illegal move to, absent injury, play a lineup that started (1) Lampl, (2) Gordon, (3) Lord. Lineups you could have legally played:
* (1) Lord, (2) Lampl, (3) Gordon
* (1) Gordon, (2) Lampl, (3) Arbuthnott (Lord taking the day off)
* (1) Lord, (2) Lampl, (3) Arbuthnott (Gordon taking the day off)
* (1) Lampl, (2) Arbuthnott, (3) Shin (both Lord and Gordon taking the day off)
But having played at #3 the last match, Lampl couldn't jump up to #1. If you wanted to legally get to the lineup vs. Hawaii, it would have to be a three-match process--i.e., playing her at #2 (and Gordon at #3) against Hawaii, playing Lampl at #1 (Lord at 2 and Gordon at 3) against UC Davis, and playing Lampl at 1, Gordon at 2, and Lord at 3 against UCLA this weekend. Now, if the goal was to give Lampl a shot at #1 but then retreat to our normal lineup, then it almost had to take place today. Why?
1. We now have time to gradually get back to our most common lineup this year (Gordon at 1, Lord at 2, Lampl at 3) before the UCLA match.
2. Third-party coaches can file lineup protests within 72 hours of the start of the match. Your first offense gets you a warning letter. The second offense gets you a 7-0 default loss in the next match where there's a violation. (Those violation letters carry over year after year, too. So if you're UCLA's coach, for example, why *not* send a protest letter?)
3. I'd expect to see a lineup today that has Gordon at 1, Lampl at 2, and Lord at 3. That would allow Lampl and Lord to switch spots again before UCLA. (That's assuming the goal is to have Gordon play 1, that is. But that's the only way the Hawaii lineup makes sense to me. If the goal was to give Lampl a shot but get Lord back at #1, then I would have expected Lord to stay at #2, and bump Gordon down to #3.)
If this was the plan, then why not start the process against Arizona? Against ASU, it was Lord-Gordon-Lampl. Against Arizona, it could have been Lord-Lampl-Gordon. Then, against Hawaii, it could have been Lampl-Lord-Gordon. Against UC Davis, it could have been Lampl-Gordon-Lord, and then against UCLA, it could have been Gordon-Lampl-Lord. (Or, if the goal was getting Lord back to #1, against UC Davis it could have been Lord-Lampl-Gordon, and then against UCLA, Lord-Gordon-Lampl.) This could also have been accomplished much more easily if Lord hadn't been moved to #1 in the first place. If ASU had been Gordon-Lord-Lampl, Arizona could have been Gordon-Lampl-Lord, Hawaii could have legally been Lampl-Gordon-Lord, UC Davis could be Gordon-Lampl-Lord, and you're back at Gordon-Lord-Lampl for UCLA.
What all that tells me is that this might actually represent some real uncertainty on Lele's part as to who truly should be playing #1. I'm not sure there was doubt before the Santa Clara match, when Gordon lost to Pothoff, but there might be legitimate doubt now. The problem is that while the rulebook mandates you set your lineup in order of ability, the rulebook assumes you've been doing that, and thus, you shouldn't need to jump your #3 up to #1 absent injury.
Challenge matches used to not be valid to move a player down in the lineup once you started the dual season, but that language isn't expressly in the rulebook anymore. Perhaps they played some challenge matches, Lampl came out on top, and this is how things shake out. But I have trouble squaring that with the language of the one-line rule. Maybe it was as simple as Lele explaining that they wanted to give Lampl a shot at #1 because she'd been playing so well, they're legitimately torn about who should play #1, and because Lele doesn't have a track record of trying to stack lineups, other coaches sort of shrugged and declined to make a protest. The fact that Lampl beat the tar out of Hawaii's one ranked player on Court 1 helps the case that this isn't stacking or trying to sandbag an opponent. I would never suspect Lele of something like that anyway. But it's still a technical violation of the one-line rule, and it doesn't matter if your heart was in the right place.
The statute of limitations is basically 72 hours from the start of the match, so unless a protest is filed by then, then this no longer matters. And perhaps Lele is relying on the norm among college coaches that protests are only filed where (1) the lineup change effectively determined the dual match result, or at least could have affected it, or (2) like Arkansas last year, the sheer number of wins in a day that involved violations of the rule, meant that a team might find itself on the outside looking in for NCAA selection. Here, neither concern is at play. No one thinks Lele was cheating. Coaches might also like to rely on that norm themselves to get a senior a chance to play #1 and not be accused of violating a rule. But if a coach wanted to call her out to use up Lele's one free violation, then I'd be hard pressed to argue with that.
It doesn't give Lele any more flexibility--she's stuck with the strictures of the one-line rule--though if she wanted to try out Lampl at 2 and Lord at 3 vs. UCLA, then she could do that now.
The UC Davis match is at 4:00pm today, so the news out of that match won't be the result--we'll win handily--but the lineup we use, and what it says about our plans for UCLA next weekend.
I just saw Stanford announce that today's match will be postponed due to rain, potentially with a makeup date this week. If it gets rained out with no makeup date, then the lineup against UCLA will be one of the following three options:
* Lampl-Gordon-Lord (the new status quo)
* Gordon-Lampl-Lord
* Lampl-Lord-Gordon
If Lele wants to get Lampl back down to #3 for UCLA, then she needs to get the UC Davis match played. Of course, the sanction for violating the one-line rule is to be ordered to go back to your previous lineup (which would be Lord-Gordon-Lampl), so if Lele's desperate to get there, she might self-report or something, or try and get a local school to play a match on short notice. But rolling with Gordon-Lampl-Lord isn't that big of a deal, really, and I'm not sure our chances of beating UCLA are materially different if the matches at #2 and #3 are Lampl-Bolton and Lord-Altick vs. Lord-Bolton and Lampl-Altick (assuming UCLA sticks with their most recent lineup).
But there is a cost to doing things like this, which is that you might not have your ideal lineup for the biggest conference match of the season.
Like oldalum, I don't actually know what was behind it, and we may never know, unless someone asks Lele after the season in an unguarded moment. And I completely agree that the fact that (1) she's a senior, and (2) she's been playing absolutely lights out played a role in it.
But yes, under the ITA Rulebook for this season, the one-line rule is still in effect, and unless I'm missing something, putting Lampl at #1 was a violation of it. You can download it here (see pages 4-5):
https://www.itatennis.com/ITA/Coaches/Rules.aspx
The key excerpt:
Quote:In back-to-back dual matches (two consecutive dual matches), the team line-up (as played) may be changed as long as the line-up stays in order of ability. A player or doubles team may be moved one line-up position from the previous match. The movement rule does not apply from the last match of the fall season to the first match of the spring season.
Because the lineup against Arizona was Lord-Gordon-Lampl, it was therefore an illegal move to, absent injury, play a lineup that started (1) Lampl, (2) Gordon, (3) Lord. Lineups you could have legally played:
* (1) Lord, (2) Lampl, (3) Gordon
* (1) Gordon, (2) Lampl, (3) Arbuthnott (Lord taking the day off)
* (1) Lord, (2) Lampl, (3) Arbuthnott (Gordon taking the day off)
* (1) Lampl, (2) Arbuthnott, (3) Shin (both Lord and Gordon taking the day off)
But having played at #3 the last match, Lampl couldn't jump up to #1. If you wanted to legally get to the lineup vs. Hawaii, it would have to be a three-match process--i.e., playing her at #2 (and Gordon at #3) against Hawaii, playing Lampl at #1 (Lord at 2 and Gordon at 3) against UC Davis, and playing Lampl at 1, Gordon at 2, and Lord at 3 against UCLA this weekend. Now, if the goal was to give Lampl a shot at #1 but then retreat to our normal lineup, then it almost had to take place today. Why?
1. We now have time to gradually get back to our most common lineup this year (Gordon at 1, Lord at 2, Lampl at 3) before the UCLA match.
2. Third-party coaches can file lineup protests within 72 hours of the start of the match. Your first offense gets you a warning letter. The second offense gets you a 7-0 default loss in the next match where there's a violation. (Those violation letters carry over year after year, too. So if you're UCLA's coach, for example, why *not* send a protest letter?)
3. I'd expect to see a lineup today that has Gordon at 1, Lampl at 2, and Lord at 3. That would allow Lampl and Lord to switch spots again before UCLA. (That's assuming the goal is to have Gordon play 1, that is. But that's the only way the Hawaii lineup makes sense to me. If the goal was to give Lampl a shot but get Lord back at #1, then I would have expected Lord to stay at #2, and bump Gordon down to #3.)
If this was the plan, then why not start the process against Arizona? Against ASU, it was Lord-Gordon-Lampl. Against Arizona, it could have been Lord-Lampl-Gordon. Then, against Hawaii, it could have been Lampl-Lord-Gordon. Against UC Davis, it could have been Lampl-Gordon-Lord, and then against UCLA, it could have been Gordon-Lampl-Lord. (Or, if the goal was getting Lord back to #1, against UC Davis it could have been Lord-Lampl-Gordon, and then against UCLA, Lord-Gordon-Lampl.) This could also have been accomplished much more easily if Lord hadn't been moved to #1 in the first place. If ASU had been Gordon-Lord-Lampl, Arizona could have been Gordon-Lampl-Lord, Hawaii could have legally been Lampl-Gordon-Lord, UC Davis could be Gordon-Lampl-Lord, and you're back at Gordon-Lord-Lampl for UCLA.
What all that tells me is that this might actually represent some real uncertainty on Lele's part as to who truly should be playing #1. I'm not sure there was doubt before the Santa Clara match, when Gordon lost to Pothoff, but there might be legitimate doubt now. The problem is that while the rulebook mandates you set your lineup in order of ability, the rulebook assumes you've been doing that, and thus, you shouldn't need to jump your #3 up to #1 absent injury.
Challenge matches used to not be valid to move a player down in the lineup once you started the dual season, but that language isn't expressly in the rulebook anymore. Perhaps they played some challenge matches, Lampl came out on top, and this is how things shake out. But I have trouble squaring that with the language of the one-line rule. Maybe it was as simple as Lele explaining that they wanted to give Lampl a shot at #1 because she'd been playing so well, they're legitimately torn about who should play #1, and because Lele doesn't have a track record of trying to stack lineups, other coaches sort of shrugged and declined to make a protest. The fact that Lampl beat the tar out of Hawaii's one ranked player on Court 1 helps the case that this isn't stacking or trying to sandbag an opponent. I would never suspect Lele of something like that anyway. But it's still a technical violation of the one-line rule, and it doesn't matter if your heart was in the right place.
The statute of limitations is basically 72 hours from the start of the match, so unless a protest is filed by then, then this no longer matters. And perhaps Lele is relying on the norm among college coaches that protests are only filed where (1) the lineup change effectively determined the dual match result, or at least could have affected it, or (2) like Arkansas last year, the sheer number of wins in a day that involved violations of the rule, meant that a team might find itself on the outside looking in for NCAA selection. Here, neither concern is at play. No one thinks Lele was cheating. Coaches might also like to rely on that norm themselves to get a senior a chance to play #1 and not be accused of violating a rule. But if a coach wanted to call her out to use up Lele's one free violation, then I'd be hard pressed to argue with that.
(03-24-2019, 11:48 PM)oldalum Wrote: perhaps this gives Lele more flexibility later for how she orders the lineup.
It doesn't give Lele any more flexibility--she's stuck with the strictures of the one-line rule--though if she wanted to try out Lampl at 2 and Lord at 3 vs. UCLA, then she could do that now.
The UC Davis match is at 4:00pm today, so the news out of that match won't be the result--we'll win handily--but the lineup we use, and what it says about our plans for UCLA next weekend.
I just saw Stanford announce that today's match will be postponed due to rain, potentially with a makeup date this week. If it gets rained out with no makeup date, then the lineup against UCLA will be one of the following three options:
* Lampl-Gordon-Lord (the new status quo)
* Gordon-Lampl-Lord
* Lampl-Lord-Gordon
If Lele wants to get Lampl back down to #3 for UCLA, then she needs to get the UC Davis match played. Of course, the sanction for violating the one-line rule is to be ordered to go back to your previous lineup (which would be Lord-Gordon-Lampl), so if Lele's desperate to get there, she might self-report or something, or try and get a local school to play a match on short notice. But rolling with Gordon-Lampl-Lord isn't that big of a deal, really, and I'm not sure our chances of beating UCLA are materially different if the matches at #2 and #3 are Lampl-Bolton and Lord-Altick vs. Lord-Bolton and Lampl-Altick (assuming UCLA sticks with their most recent lineup).
But there is a cost to doing things like this, which is that you might not have your ideal lineup for the biggest conference match of the season.