Central Region Round Robin

I know what we call three teams that all play one another, but what is it called when four teams get together and do the same thing? Is it a square? A box? A round robin? Either way, I tried to come up with something as funny as D3West would, but failed miserably. (Thoughts on calling it a fat pigeon? Get it?!?) Like I said, it was a rough afternoon for comedy. Either way this is a big weekend in the Central with multiple layers to why it is so important. We have in region matches with ranking purposes. We have UAA conference matches with seeds on the line. We have interesting individual matches that will undoubtedly have an impact on who qualifies for nationals. That goes for doubles as well. The good news is, Case and Coe are rather active with their twitter updates so the only match we may not get anything during the battle will be Wash U and Chicago. Chicago gives us a little, but not much. Here will be a run down of when the matches are and what my thoughts on each will be:

Friday

Case Western vs. Chicago

There are two very big questions that come to mind for this match that will affect the outcome. 1) Will Klawitter play for Case? and 2) Will Chicago be the team that beat Cal Lu or the team that lost to Whitewater?. I am going to cop out and sort of be in the middle for both questions. I think Klawittter will play doubles only like he did against Carnegie this past weekend. He was in and out of a boot for the past couple weeks and having a weekend with three matches against top teams isn’t exactly easy on an old man’s body. Trust me, I know. As for Chicago, I think they will fall somewhere in the middle. The Cal Lu win was huge for them and definitely a boost to the confidence, but I think Case will eliminate that confidence pretty quickly after doubles is finished. There isn’t anything tougher than getting hit in the face with doubles and have to come back and overcome the 3-0 scoreline (unless you have the singles lineup of Carnegie, Emory, Amherst, or CMS). I actually think that Chicago matches up pretty favorably with Case in singles as they have depth, but it won’t be enough to come back from a doubles deficit. With that, I pick Case to sweep doubles pretty comfortably. I am picking Krimball over Kranz, Drougas over Sabada, Bhargava over Fojtasek, Sun over Reinbold, Healey over Szabo, and Hawkins over whatever lame duck Case throws out there. So for those of you keeping score at home, Case sweeps dubs and they will split the singles evenly 3-3 for a final tally of 6-3 in favor of the Spartans. Krimball vs. Kranz has slight ranking considerations, but a loss by either still should keep them in the Top 5 of the region.

Saturday

Chicago vs. Coe

Ah I am sure Coe is absolutely salivating over this match as it will be their first chance to make some noise in the Central region and prove they belong in the conversation. They have some decent wins with comfortable victories over Elmhurst (13 in the region) and Luther (15 in the region). While I think Coe is a solid team top to bottom, they just don’t have enough to make Chicago sweat. The problem with Coe is they aren’t strong enough throughout the lineup to pull an upset. Their doubles have been solid and I could see them being up 2-1 after dubs (I am predicting Chicago to actually be up 2-1), they don’t have any other spots to rely on outside of Sprinkel at the one spot to make the argument they could win the team match. Sprinkel is undefeated against Central teams this spring and will probably peak at 2 or 3 in the region when rankings come out this Thursday so his match-up with Kranz (4 in the region) will be great. I am giving Sprinkel the edge. I believe Coe’s 2 singles player Galbraith can give Sabada a scare, but I have to give Deepak the slight edge as he has better wins over the last few months. Three though six really should be all Chicago and I expect straight set victories for the Maroons. So as I mentioned, my expectations are Chicago to be leading 2-1 after doubles and then take five of the six singles spots for a 7-2 victory. Coe can make things interesting for sure, but it might need a little help from the Chicago professors beating up on the Maroons the week before or schedule massive assignments due the following Monday. Chicago has laid an egg before so here’s for hoping for Easter a week early.

Wash U vs. Case Western

This is definitely the match of the weekend with the most on the line. The way things sit (as long as Case beats Chicago the night before), Wash U will be the 1 seed going into the conference tournament and Case will be the 4. Emory will be 2 and Carnegie as the 3. Case can blow things wide open by beating Wash U in the regular season which they did last year. The one seed is going to be monumental for Wash U because I can guarantee that nobody wants to play Carnegie in the semi finals of the conference tournament so I would expect the Bears to fully understand the importance of this match. This match is extremely interesting to me because both teams are capable of the doubles sweep and I think it will be important to take the lead. Again, I have to speculate that Klawitter will only be playing doubles for this match. Case has only been behind after doubles against one other team this year (Trinity TX) when the Klaw plays (They were also down to Emory, but with 3 different doubles teams). The Spartans decimated Carnegie for the sweep, but Wash U isn’t exactly anything like that. Wash U also swept Carnegie when they played at the Stag Hen. Krimball/Klaw vs. Putterman/Bush should be a great one, but you have to give the slightest of edge to the Case tandem. Carswell and Cogan are newer partners together as Wash U failed to win any matches at 2 doubles at Indoors. The pair seem to have righted the ship and only have lost to CMS since. Drougas and Healey haven’t lost since Indoors so I expect 2 doubles to be a huge swing match. At three, Case has tinkered a bit as to who will play with Reinbold as Stuerke joined him against CMU and impressed. I would think Coach Todd would keep them together to take on two of three Wash U opponents (Chu/Hirsch/Kratky). I am going to give Wash U a slight edge for no real good reason other than Follmer will make sure this team is ready to go. Singles will have massive implications for nationals and it still looks like Follmer will be keeping the freshman Carswell at 2 behind Putterman. Putterman will have three chances to take out guys above him in the rankings with the first chance coming against Krimball in this match. I just think Krimball is too strong. Something of note, Krimball has a three set loss to Carswell in the fall ITA. By keeping Carswell at 2, Wash U will have the edge at their spots that have been locks all season. Carswell over Drougas, Bush over Fojtasek (my money is it will be a blowout), and Noack over Reinbold. Kratky has been a little shaky against the top competition, but Healey isn’t considered that so he should win and as previously stated, six singles is extremely weak for Case so Chu should win easily. If Klawitter is in the singles lineup, not a whole lot changes except I would favor Reinbold over Kratky if he were to play 5. With all things considered, I am going to say Case is up 2-1 after dubs (giving Case the win at 2 dubs), but will only get the win from Krimball making it 6-3 Wash U. Even if Klawitter plays singles, I still think Wash U wins this match 5-4. But like I mentioned, either team is capable of a doubles sweep. If Wash U does it, this will be a blow out. If Case does it, you better believe it will make singles a whole lot of fun to follow.

Case Western vs. Coe

The big headliner of this match-up will be at one singles. Noah Sprinkel has put up quite a resume this spring and will take on Krimball. Regional rankings will be out this Thursday and I expect Krimball to stay as the top player in the region and Sprinkel will likely be at three. There is no doubt that Krimball is the top player, but Sprinkel has comfortable wins against Smith-Dennis from GAC and Kreis from Wheaton both of which are previous national qualifiers (I think. Not sure about Smith-Dennis). It should be a battle and I would give Krimball the edge, but only slightly. Needless to say I will be interested in the final score line. They both will be coming off of a tough match earlier in the day. As for the rest of the match, Coe may be able to compete at the bottom of the lineup as Case is weaker there, but I just don’t see if happening. I am going with an 8-1 victory for Case or 7-2 if Sprinkel pulls out the mini upset. I don’t want to take anything away from Coe’s doubles because they are usually very disciplined, but Case is just stronger.

Sunday

Wash U vs. Chicago

This one could be interesting in that Chicago has the singles depth to battle with Wash U. Doubles you clearly have to give the edge to the Bears, but I will say that Chicago will steal a point for a Wash U 2-1 lead heading into singles. I will once again highlight the 1 singles match between Putterman (likely) and Kranz. I think Kranz is a good player and very much deserving to be in the Top 8 of the region, but maybe a bit over hyped. This is Putterman’s chance to get a big Top 8 win to legitimize his position and I think he does it, albeit in a 3-setter. Wash U has proven to be virtually unstoppable 2-4 so I definitely favor them in those spots, but Brian Sun (4 singles) has been playing well so I think him and Noack will battle it out. It seems as if Chicago has finally figured out the bottom of the lineup with Szabo and Hawkins which I completely agree with. Zheng just hasn’t proven that he deserves to be in the singles lineup as he cannot pull out wins against the top competition. Both players have a shot to take down either Kratky or Chu and I think one of them will giving the Maroons one win in doubles and one win in singles for a final of 7-2 in favor of the Bears.

Wash U vs. Coe

Similar to the Case match-up, one singles will have my attention. The big question will be if Putterman goes 0-2 in his matchups with Krimball and Kranz, will Follmer finally make the switch to put Carswell at the top spot to get him into nationals. I would actually favor Carswell over Sprinkel, but would not favor Putterman. Needless to say you can tell that I think Carswell is the better player, but what is better for the Bears in the long run has to be on Follmer’s mind. I think Putterman is able to save his season by beating Kranz in the morning match and the lineup will stay the same. With that, I think Sprinkel will beat him particularly because it will be Wash U’s second match of the day and Coe’s first. Wash U is always a fit team, but a lot can be said for being fresh physically and psychologically. The other matches again won’t be as close and I could easily see a 9-0 sweep by the Bears, but will give Coe a point either in doubles or 5/6 singles for an 8-1 route.

Depauw vs. Gustavus

This match almost got forgotten with the big weekend of the four teams above, but luckily I was able to catch it before I posted the blog. I think it is an interesting match in a lot of ways, but particularly because doubles is a strong suit for both of these teams. Depauw is coming off a spring break where they went 16-2 in doubles against quality opponents specifically being up 2-1 on both Kenyon and Whitewater. Gustavus is coming off their trip out east where they battled a 5-4 win against Tufts and came close to upsetting Middlebury losing by the same score line. Kopecky and Miles have been playing together forever now and the tandem of Smith-Dennis/Al-Houni will be a great top doubles match. I almost would say each spot is a coin flip, but would lean towards giving Gustavus the 2-1 lead after doubles. Depauw will lean heavy on their 2 seniors to make the upset possible. Miles is coming off a big win against Humphreys and Kopecky took out Heerboth so you could argue they are the hottest 1-2 punch in the region. That isn’t me saying they are the best, but clearly both are capable of beating anyone. Gustavus has been tinkering a bit and it looks like Luis Chu is now at 1 singles and Smith Dennis at 2. I believe these matches will be split with Luis Chu victorious for GAC and Kopecky for Depauw which brings the score to 3-2 GAC. The freshman Farrell has struggled a bit at 3 so Gustavus has the edge there, but 4-6 could go either way. If the Tigers want to win the match, they will need to sweep these spots and I don’t think they will. I am going with Gustavus to win this one 6-3, but could easily see it going 5-4 either way.

And finally I want to make a small public service announcement to the entire Central region. I am glad that some of you are actually paying attention to the things that I write or tweet as it seems the Central is the least active in terms of commenting and feedback for the blog. However, I finally got some response in the recent days from disgruntled followers. My message to you is a comparison. Have you ever heard of a coach or parent saying that they are hard on you because they see the most potential? Or if they are not yelling at you, it means they don’t care? That is exactly how you should view my criticism. I see so much potential in some of our region teams to be even more successful than they already are. To become a top tier team, barriers have to be broken. Whether those barriers are the rigor of the academic program (Chicago), recruitment to a less than desirable location (Coe), seemingly lack of leadership to develop the talent (Denison), or inability to reach the prowess of year’s past (Depauw), I am critical of all the teams. However, I am most critical of the four teams aforementioned because they are the ones that need to take one more step to thrust themselves on to the national stage once again. Other teams would love to have the advantages you have with talent, facilities, academics, etc. Take advantage of what you have so that teams chomping at your heels to take over simply can’t do it. So sticking with the comparison model, I yell because I care. I want to see you succeed. I hope you understand this and I have nothing but love for the teams of my region. Keep fighting and as always, let the rackets do the talking.