Happy freezing cold Sunday in the dead of winter everyone! I hope you are all staying nice and warm and all the kiddos are out getting ready for another great season of DIII tennis. After watching the new Spiderman: Far From Home trailer, I was inspired by Jake Gyllenhaal’s new character Mysterio to write about one of the more mysterious teams that I cover, the Battling Bishops of NC Wesleyan. This team has a ton of new players, but lost one of their all time great’s, Sebastian Sikh. This team could either be crazy talented and return to the elite 8 or they could be just above mediocre and drop a match to a team outside the top 40.
Location: Rocky Mount, NC
Coach: Albie Brice (2nd year-ish)
ITA National Ranking: 15
ITA Regional Ranking: 3 (Atlantic South)
Blog Power Ranking: 17
Twitter Handle: @NCWBishopTennis (been inactive for a hot minute)
UTR Power 6: 68 maybe?
Key Departures: Sebastian Sikh, Mark Sokolov, JD Telles (no longer on the roster)
Key Additions: A picture is worth a thousand words… 
There are a TON of new bishops, this fall there were 16 and now there are 13. Most of them we really don’t know a ton about. Based on UTR, which isn’t the most accurate metric, the “top 5” would be Ignacio Benzal Alia (UTR 11.57), Juan Pablo Vallejo Alvarez (UTR 11.04 provisional), Nikita Revin (UTR 10.92), Jordan Evans (UTR 10.92) and Jhonny Acosta (UTR 10.51 provisional).
Player(s) to Watch: Roberto Puig – From a strong 4-5 singles in the 2018 season to pushing Emory’s Hayden Cassone to 3 sets at ITAs is quite a big jump. I think this guy is poised to have a very good season and should be a fun player to follow over the course of this season. *Spoiler alert* He’s probably not going to be playing 4 or 5 this season.
Schedule Analysis: This schedule is fairly similar to last seasons, you can view it here. The first Saturday of the season will start off with what should be a nice W for the Bishops over Hampden Sydney and then they take on DII Barton. I will keep my eyes on this match because I’m expecting NC Wes to roll out their full lineup in this one. February 9th is a blockbuster Atlantic South matchup between the Battling Bishops and real ASouths favorite, the UMW Eagles. This match should be an absolute barn burner, so be on the lookout for a more in depth preview for this match as it draws closer.
Shaw is next up on the schedule, and I really don’t know much about them besides the fact that they’re DII sooooo, thank u, next. The Battling Bishops make a trip up the east coast to Newport News, Virginia for another weekend with big regional ranking implications. On Saturday, they will play Christopher Newport before turning around and taking on Johns Hopkins on Sunday. This team has the potential to come out of this 2-0 with CNU seemingly on the decline and the Jays riding the tank bus at the moment. I’m gonna hit fast forward on this next part of this schedule because it’s mainly cupcake conference matches and a DII team that isn’t really relevant to DIII tennis.
The next notable match is all the way in April, where the Bishops travel all the way up to Ewing, New Jersey to take on the Lions of TCNJ. NC Wes should have the edge and will need to win this match to maintain a high a top 20 national ranking and TCNJ will need to win for Pool B purposes. Keep an eye on this one. The rest of the schedule is more conference matches and an exhibition before the USA South tournament. They should handle the tournament and be one of the first teams to book their NCAA tickets as per usual. Overall this schedule is OK at best. I know the geography and budget limits this team on how far they can travel but I would love to see them play more highly ranked Atlantic South opponents or make a trip down to Orlando to take on some of the nation’s best.
Lineup Analysis: I’ve been having nightmares about this because of how wide open this is, so let’s just get into it…
1 Singles: Ioannis Brokakis – SENIOR. While his UTR is lower than a few others on the team, I still think Mr. Brokakis will hold on to the top spot. He has played #1 before and I think experience at the top is invaluable. He also had the best ITA run going all the way to the quarterfinals before having to retire. Brokakis should be strong at the top of the lineup, which will be key to retaining the #3 ranking in the region.
2 Singles: Roberto Puig – The Battling Bishops’ player to watch should slot in very nicely at the #2 singles spot this season. He has good fall results as well as a singles title from the Methodist invitational singles tournament. This sophomore will have his hands full in the big matches against UMW and Hopkins, but if he can pull out those matches, he significantly increases his team’s chance to win.
3 Singles: Ignacio Alia-Rodriguez – It looks like the freshman was overseas this fall playing futures, but if he comes back in the spring, he will no doubt become a key contributor for this team. He obviously has the talent and has some very good wins in futures so I wouldn’t be surprised to see him jump up in the lineup as the season progresses.
4 Singles: Jhonny Acosta – While his UTR might not be as high as some of the people slotted behind him, Coach Brice set him in the #2 singles bracket at the Methodist invitational, so based off of that, I think he’ll be a little higher in the lineup. The freshman from Paraguay had a decent fall and will most likely be anywhere from #4-6 singles or maybe even on the outside looking in.
5 Singles: Aditya Ayer – The 6’3” sophomore was very successful last season at 3 and 5 singles with wins over Hopkins’ Austin Gu and Case’s Robert Stroup, so he should be an almost guaranteed win for this team in most matches this season if he falls to 4 or 5 in the lineup.
6 Singles: Juan Vallejo – The freshman should take the last spot in the Bishops’ lineup. He pushed Sewanee’s Andre Carro to a close third set at ITAs and captured the #4 singles title at the Methodist Invite. He will be a stud at #6. That’s all.
In the Hunt: Nikita Revin, Jesus Gil – Both of these players are just on the outside looking in, but should both have opportunities to slide into the lineup and prove themselves this season. This team appears to have a ton of guys around the same level, so I would expect to see a little bit of a revolving door at the last couple of singles spots.
Keys to Success:
Leadership – On a team with 13 freshman, you need leaders to step up and take charge in order to establish a positive team culture. With only two seniors, it’ll be up to Coach Brice and the sophomores and juniors to take charge and build this culture with this team that has not necessarily had it in the past.
Depth – This team is super deep with plenty of options at the bottom of the lineup and I think this will be one of the Bishops’ strengths this season. They will really need to flex this when they take on CNU, Hopkins and UMW. If they want to win these matches they will need to win at 4-6, but the good news is that they have the number of quality players to do so.
Doubles – I know I literally say doubles all the time, but it’s so true. With a team of 22, you need to make sure you have the right combinations and chemistry between doubles partners to be successful. This team traditionally has not been the most disciplined doubles program, so they will need to be very aware of this as a group and really focus on the fundamentals going into this season if they want to remain a top 3 team in the region and a top 15 team in the country.
Realistic Best Case Scenario: A realistic best case scenario for this team is actually an undefeated record going into NCAAs. I know it might seem crazy, but all of their matches, including UMW and Hopkins are completely winnable if this team is as talented as I think they are.
Realistic Worst Case Scenario: A worse case scenario would be a conference title, but losses to CNU, UMW, Hopkins and TCNJ. I think they are much much better than the rest of the teams in the USA South, but when they play the more established teams, they could be in trouble because of their youth and inexperience.
Prediction: I think this team will like up to the hype and have a very good season this year. I think they will falter against UMW, but will clean it up and go undefeated the rest of the season before bowing out in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA tournament most likely to Emory.
There you have it, the Battling Bishops folks. Do you have any comments or questions? Do you know something that I don’t? Leave a comment, send me an email or come @ me on twitter! Sewanee is up next, so be on the lookout for that preview in the next week. Until next time, Reg ASouth out!
Good read. Interesting team.