05-16-2022, 12:48 PM
You want optimism for next year? Here it is. (I'll do a more comprehensive preview when the season gets going again this fall, but for now, here's why I'm very bullish on Stanford women's tennis next year.)
* We were an incredibly young team this year. We started freshmen at 1, 2, and 5, something I can't remember this team doing before in the time since I started following them closely. Losing in the final 16 ain't so bad for such a young team, especially on the road. With the freshman class we had, I thought next year was when we'd challenge for a title, but maybe, just maybe, things would come together for this year.
* This is not a slight to Sara Choy or Niluka Madurawe, but in terms of on-court presence, we don't lose a great deal. We return our top 6 singles players, if you include both Houghton and Geller. Everyone is a year older and a year wiser.
* Geller can still be a big piece for us, and recall that she did very well at #4 singles as a freshman in spring 2021. She wasn't herself this year but still had a couple nice results in the preseason.
* This is the most tennis Connie Ma has ever played in such a short timeframe. Recall that her parents put such a priority on being a normal (albeit very high-achieving) high school student that she skipped most of the big tournaments that other junior players attend. She's now in an environment where she practices more and plays more high-level matches than she ever did, and that should lead to a nice jump in her game once she gets used to it. And perhaps we'll even see her in more tournaments over the summer, further jumpstarting that development. And while she has the talent to perhaps leave early, that dedication to academics tells me we don't have to worry about her leaving early. I expect Ma to be a perennial feature in the top 10 for the rest of her career.
* Like Lele said in that interview, Yepifanova's potential is through the roof. We have two players ranked in the 20s as freshmen. That's absurd. And both of them just learned a lot about tough NCAA matches and finishing this year. They'll be better next year.
* In terms of what's coming in the door, we have the #2 class in the nation (behind USC, unfortunately). Alexis Blokhina is currently the #6 recruit in the country (has peaked as high as #4 in the class), and Emma Sun has charged up the rankings year by year, and she's now the #11 recruit (having peaked at 10).
* First, Blokhina. She's a hard-hitting lefty even though she's not super tall. She's compact but powerful, a little reminiscent of Caroline Lampl when Lampl was at her best. She's currently the 32nd-ranked junior in the world, having peaked a few weeks ago at 25th. That's nearly 20 spots higher than her previous career high, and the reason why is she just won the Easter Bowl, one of the preeminent junior tennis tournaments in the country. She did it in exciting fashion, too, knocking off UNC-bound Reese Brantmeier, who is arguably the top recruit in the country this year, in a third-set tiebreaker. She's 1-1 in her career against our own Alexandra Yepifanova, beating Sasha 6-2, 6-4 in March of 2021. She lost in three sets to Valencia Xu last August, around the same time she was partnering with Xu at the U.S. Open girls' tournament. She has some three-set wins against some top NCAA competitors, including a win over UGA's Mell Reasco, who mostly played #2 for Georgia this year but took over the #1 spot as a freshman down the stretch for the Bulldogs, though that win is aging a bit, coming in February 2020. In the $25K Sarasota tournament last week, she knocked off Adriana Reami in three sets (Reami just finished up a terrific career at NC State a year ago, where she finished as the program's all-time leader in singles wins, playing in the top half of the lineup her whole career (mostly at #3 singles). She has a few three-set losses against elite NCAA players like South Carolina's Sara Hamner and Iowa's Alexa Noel. When she was 13, she became the youngest-ever Florida 18U state champion. She's got an interesting tennis profile, as she lacks a lot of history against other American blue chip recruits, but unlike Ma, it's because she has been playing a ton of international competition, focusing on European ITF junior tournaments. Seems like she's intent on a pro career, so she may be a risk to move on early, but perhaps she reconsiders if she doesn't vault over Ma and Yepifanova in our lineup (and I don't think she will).
* Looking at Emma Sun, she has something of a Ma-like profile in that she focused on high school tennis to the exclusion of a lot of tournament play. Unlike Blokhina (who is very active on Instagram), Sun's instagram profile gives little hint she's an elite tennis player. Just six posts, three of which are related to high-level piano competitions, and just one related to tennis--her Stanford commitment post. Looking at this old LA Times article, she seems like she's close to the platonic ideal of a Stanford student-athlete, where school and music often come first: https://www.latimes.com/sports/highschoo...nd-a-stage . I wouldn't expect her to come in and play near the top of the lineup by any means, but she strikes me as a player who has a lot of untapped potential and someone who could climb in the lineup as she devotes more of her life to tennis. But my current expectations from her are slightly higher than I had for Choy coming in.
* We were an incredibly young team this year. We started freshmen at 1, 2, and 5, something I can't remember this team doing before in the time since I started following them closely. Losing in the final 16 ain't so bad for such a young team, especially on the road. With the freshman class we had, I thought next year was when we'd challenge for a title, but maybe, just maybe, things would come together for this year.
* This is not a slight to Sara Choy or Niluka Madurawe, but in terms of on-court presence, we don't lose a great deal. We return our top 6 singles players, if you include both Houghton and Geller. Everyone is a year older and a year wiser.
* Geller can still be a big piece for us, and recall that she did very well at #4 singles as a freshman in spring 2021. She wasn't herself this year but still had a couple nice results in the preseason.
* This is the most tennis Connie Ma has ever played in such a short timeframe. Recall that her parents put such a priority on being a normal (albeit very high-achieving) high school student that she skipped most of the big tournaments that other junior players attend. She's now in an environment where she practices more and plays more high-level matches than she ever did, and that should lead to a nice jump in her game once she gets used to it. And perhaps we'll even see her in more tournaments over the summer, further jumpstarting that development. And while she has the talent to perhaps leave early, that dedication to academics tells me we don't have to worry about her leaving early. I expect Ma to be a perennial feature in the top 10 for the rest of her career.
* Like Lele said in that interview, Yepifanova's potential is through the roof. We have two players ranked in the 20s as freshmen. That's absurd. And both of them just learned a lot about tough NCAA matches and finishing this year. They'll be better next year.
* In terms of what's coming in the door, we have the #2 class in the nation (behind USC, unfortunately). Alexis Blokhina is currently the #6 recruit in the country (has peaked as high as #4 in the class), and Emma Sun has charged up the rankings year by year, and she's now the #11 recruit (having peaked at 10).
* First, Blokhina. She's a hard-hitting lefty even though she's not super tall. She's compact but powerful, a little reminiscent of Caroline Lampl when Lampl was at her best. She's currently the 32nd-ranked junior in the world, having peaked a few weeks ago at 25th. That's nearly 20 spots higher than her previous career high, and the reason why is she just won the Easter Bowl, one of the preeminent junior tennis tournaments in the country. She did it in exciting fashion, too, knocking off UNC-bound Reese Brantmeier, who is arguably the top recruit in the country this year, in a third-set tiebreaker. She's 1-1 in her career against our own Alexandra Yepifanova, beating Sasha 6-2, 6-4 in March of 2021. She lost in three sets to Valencia Xu last August, around the same time she was partnering with Xu at the U.S. Open girls' tournament. She has some three-set wins against some top NCAA competitors, including a win over UGA's Mell Reasco, who mostly played #2 for Georgia this year but took over the #1 spot as a freshman down the stretch for the Bulldogs, though that win is aging a bit, coming in February 2020. In the $25K Sarasota tournament last week, she knocked off Adriana Reami in three sets (Reami just finished up a terrific career at NC State a year ago, where she finished as the program's all-time leader in singles wins, playing in the top half of the lineup her whole career (mostly at #3 singles). She has a few three-set losses against elite NCAA players like South Carolina's Sara Hamner and Iowa's Alexa Noel. When she was 13, she became the youngest-ever Florida 18U state champion. She's got an interesting tennis profile, as she lacks a lot of history against other American blue chip recruits, but unlike Ma, it's because she has been playing a ton of international competition, focusing on European ITF junior tournaments. Seems like she's intent on a pro career, so she may be a risk to move on early, but perhaps she reconsiders if she doesn't vault over Ma and Yepifanova in our lineup (and I don't think she will).
* Looking at Emma Sun, she has something of a Ma-like profile in that she focused on high school tennis to the exclusion of a lot of tournament play. Unlike Blokhina (who is very active on Instagram), Sun's instagram profile gives little hint she's an elite tennis player. Just six posts, three of which are related to high-level piano competitions, and just one related to tennis--her Stanford commitment post. Looking at this old LA Times article, she seems like she's close to the platonic ideal of a Stanford student-athlete, where school and music often come first: https://www.latimes.com/sports/highschoo...nd-a-stage . I wouldn't expect her to come in and play near the top of the lineup by any means, but she strikes me as a player who has a lot of untapped potential and someone who could climb in the lineup as she devotes more of her life to tennis. But my current expectations from her are slightly higher than I had for Choy coming in.