10-21-2024, 09:24 AM
FYI, several other regional tournaments were in full swing over the weekend, and Eleana Yu clinched a spot at the NCAA singles championship by making the final of the Carolina Regional. She was set to face a teammate there, and they decided to just not play the final.
The match result that stands out the most is a 6-1, 6-3 drubbing of UNC's Carson Tanguilig, the preseason #26 player and someone who has played high in the Tar Heel lineup for a while now.
Nothing we can do about it now, but recognizing that you had a player whose connection to the program might be more tenuous than Lele was used to, she needed to work Yu into the lineup more last year to give her a realistic belief that she'd contribute more this year. I get that Lele was constitutionally disinclined to coddle, and her approach was undeniably effective over the arc of her career. But it also seems clear that Yu and her parents needed a little coddling.
Yu is better than Valencia Xu now. She was better than Xu last year. (Not a lot better, mind you. And not by as much as I'm sure Yu thinks. But still--better.) If Yu played #6 regularly for us last year, I have to believe that she'd still be here. And we wouldn't potentially be relying on Houghton to play 6 in a year where we could make a decent run at the title, with Ma, Yepifanova, and Xu in their last year and our best freshman in a little while in Glozman coming in.
That said, Yu would also still be here if she'd been willing to prove herself and work her way up the lineup over time--you know, like how everyone else has had to do it. So, please don't misunderstand that I'm putting this solely on the coaches. You picked Stanford for a reason, you know? And you made a good choice! But as it turns out, perhaps your self-assessment of your skills doesn't totally line up with your coach's assessment. You can either work to change that assessment, or you can give up. And while I absolutely think kids these days should have the right to transfer pretty freely, it still bugs me how readily they exercise that right rather than push through some adversity that--in the grand scheme of life--isn't all that bad.
Eleana Yu is not going to make millions of dollars on the WTA. So, accepting that fact, how do you best set yourself up for success in life? (The problem, I assume, is that she doesn't accept that fact. But if a coaching staff that wants to win thinks that six other players on the Stanford lineup are better than you right now, then that should be a blaring alarm that you're not as good as you think you are.)
The match result that stands out the most is a 6-1, 6-3 drubbing of UNC's Carson Tanguilig, the preseason #26 player and someone who has played high in the Tar Heel lineup for a while now.
Nothing we can do about it now, but recognizing that you had a player whose connection to the program might be more tenuous than Lele was used to, she needed to work Yu into the lineup more last year to give her a realistic belief that she'd contribute more this year. I get that Lele was constitutionally disinclined to coddle, and her approach was undeniably effective over the arc of her career. But it also seems clear that Yu and her parents needed a little coddling.
Yu is better than Valencia Xu now. She was better than Xu last year. (Not a lot better, mind you. And not by as much as I'm sure Yu thinks. But still--better.) If Yu played #6 regularly for us last year, I have to believe that she'd still be here. And we wouldn't potentially be relying on Houghton to play 6 in a year where we could make a decent run at the title, with Ma, Yepifanova, and Xu in their last year and our best freshman in a little while in Glozman coming in.
That said, Yu would also still be here if she'd been willing to prove herself and work her way up the lineup over time--you know, like how everyone else has had to do it. So, please don't misunderstand that I'm putting this solely on the coaches. You picked Stanford for a reason, you know? And you made a good choice! But as it turns out, perhaps your self-assessment of your skills doesn't totally line up with your coach's assessment. You can either work to change that assessment, or you can give up. And while I absolutely think kids these days should have the right to transfer pretty freely, it still bugs me how readily they exercise that right rather than push through some adversity that--in the grand scheme of life--isn't all that bad.
Eleana Yu is not going to make millions of dollars on the WTA. So, accepting that fact, how do you best set yourself up for success in life? (The problem, I assume, is that she doesn't accept that fact. But if a coaching staff that wants to win thinks that six other players on the Stanford lineup are better than you right now, then that should be a blaring alarm that you're not as good as you think you are.)