Hello beautiful people! I hope you’ve had a great summer after that spectacular Williams-Emory final in which Williams took the 5-4 win that came down to the wire! I’m here to kick off the Women’s season with our very own version of the Top 10 Burning Questions of the Year, so let’s get this started. I’ll use some of the questions from my colleague D3AS on the men’s side.
10 Burning Questions for the Women’s 2016 Season
1. Will Williams continue to dominate, or can another team(s) emerge to take over?
Early signs are showing that #1 Williams is not slowing down. Their top player, Raventos, just handed Eudice her first loss of her college career. But it is WAY too early to tell. We have a lot of tennis to play, a lot of drama that will unfold, a lot of hungry returners, and a lot of new freshmen looking to do some damage.
Looking at the Top 10, it looks like both Emory and Amherst may have the personnel to topple Williams. I can guarantee it will be an exciting May!
2. Which recruits are going to make the needed difference to propel a team forward?
Without any real results, it’s hard to tell which recruits will rise and which will fall by the wayside. From the initial looks of things, it looks like the 5 star from Wesleyan is a stud. Here’s a rough ranked list of 4 stars (and the 5 star) with UTRs. I realize there are probably 3 stars with higher UTRs but that’s way too much work for just an initial report.
Yu (#17 Wesleyan) 10.10
Cosme (#2 Emory) 9.74
Chen (#3 Amherst) 9.34
Zhu (#9 MIT) 9.15
Kim (#7 Pomona) 8.97
Neveux (#1 Williams) 8.91
Casper (#7 Pomona) 8.89
Booth (#3 Amherst) 8.86
Bynoe (#15 Chicago) 8.71
Lopez (#2 Emory) 8.61
Kim (#15 Chicago) 10.00 (30% reliability)
3. Will any mid-tier teams be able to bust into the Top 10?
Looking at the Top 20, I would say that the teams that have a chance at cracking the Top 10 are #15 Chicago and #17 Wesleyan. Chicago had some close results last year but they just couldn’t get those matches to go their way. With the addition of a couple of strong recruits and some valuable experience from last year, they should be able to gain a little ground. Wesleyan will be a dangerous team this year. With the 5 star and Eudice, they are going into a lot of matches with big advantages at the top. Can the rest of the team support??
Looking at the current list of Top 15 teams, the list looks to be fairly strong, except for a couple of teams that were hit hard by graduation (which I’ll talk about below). This is going to make the matches very high stakes and a lot of fun to watch this year!
4. Any teams #31-#40 making a move to the Top 30?
Looking at some matches that they have already played (not many!), #31 Wellesley looks like a deceivingly tough team. They lost SoJung Lee at the top of their lineup due to graduation but their lineup is respectably deep and I suspect that that is going to help them leap into the 20s. I’m also really looking forward to watching their match on 10/3 against Babson. It’s an interesting conference matchup, with Babson stronger at the top, Wellesley deeper at the bottom. Someone in the middle of the lineup will be the hero.
I also see #32 Trinity (TX) making a move to up. With a strong coach and fairly strong recruiting classes I think they are on the way up.
5. Any newcomers to the Top 40?
I think that The College of New Jersey will make their way into the Top 40 for the first time in a while. If I remember correctly, they used to be a mainstay in the top 20! Welcome back!
6. Which teams will take a fall this year?
#10 Washington & Lee and #14 DePauw were two teams that had a great year last year. Most of their starting lineups were seniors and that senior leadership helped the teams achieve a lot last year, with W&L getting ranked as high as #4 in the nation, and DePauw making it all the way to the Elite 8. Unfortunately, now they have to spend some time reloading and rebuilding. Interestingly, both teams will be playing in the Indoor National Tournament to kick off the spring season.
7. Pool C?
Remember this? http://www.division3tennis.com/womens-pool-c/
It was unfortunate that the NCAA reduced Pool C to 8 spots (from 9 spots), but the Pool C race ended up being pretty exciting last year, with #15 Chicago claiming the last spot. Many teams were in the hunt until their last match. I’m looking forward to following the adventures this year!
8. What kind of impact can we expect from the plethora of new coaches?
ACTUALLY, I believe the only new coach in the Top 40 is Lori Shulman for #30 Trinity (CT)!! Good luck to Coach Shulman!
9. What’s happened in the fall season so far? Any matches to look forward to?
Looking at the Top 40, I think the only teams that play team matches in the fall season are teams in the WIAC (#26 UWW) and NEWMAC (#9 MIT, #31 Wellesley, #35 Babson). Nothing really notable has happened as of yet. Both conference’s conference championships will occur 10/24/15-10/25/15. MIT has already played against Wellesley (9-0 for MIT). MIT will play Babson on 9/22/15 and as I mentioned above, the match of the season has got to be Wellesley v Babson on 10/3/15.
AND there is the annual fall #1 Williams v #3 Amherst match, also on 10/3/15 (big day!!) This is a big high quality match indeed, but the stakes will be higher for the Wellesley v Babson match, since it’s an in-season conference match.
Otherwise it looks like it’s all individual tournaments.
10. Who’s going to be the new D3CentralWomen’s?
We shall see!!!!!
OK that’s it for now from me! I’m looking forward to my second year on the blog! Let’s see if I can avoid the dreaded sophomore slump!
Great kick off article. Look forward to following you all year. Can’t wait to see what Chicago, Wesleyan and Pomona will do. Amherst and Emory graduating no one from their starting line ups and getting strong recruiting classes!?? Look out Williams. This should be an exciting year.