Middlebury Invitational Recap

Middlebury Invitational Recap

Hakuna Matata my lovelies. It’s D3NE back to recap the only important NE tennis from this young 2014 fall season, the Middlebury Invitational. Seems like only yesterday I was writing the 2013 recap as a “try-out” for Headmaster D3AS and The Blog. Well as the Circle of Life continues, D3Regional has agreed to try his hand at this recapping thing. We were originally just going to do our own thing and split the teams up, but seeing as D3R Just Can’t Wait to be King he wanted to give his take on all of the teams. Instead of fighting, I agreed to his ridiculous demands. Can You Feel the Love Tonight?  Be Prepared reader, if the intro is any indication, this post could get Elton John ugly by the end. I’ll say this once and I’ll say it again, everything here is going to be an extreme over-reaction! We only have 1 weekend of tennis under our belts and right now I’m just excited to be writing about some actual substance. NCAAs were not decided this weekend, and lots of teams have players abroad. That being said, you’re reading this because you’re just as excited as I am. Let’s get to some overreactions!

 

Middlebury:

Grade: A-

Best Result: The Panther faithful has to be pleased with the whole tournament. 8 finalists and 3 flight winners should have Bob-O feeling cautiously optimistic about the upcoming season. In my mind the best result has to be Noah Farrell in the A flight. I know the freshman didn’t win the flight, he eventually fell to teammate Ari Smolyar in the finals, but over the weekend Noah made an immediate claim to a lineup spot. He took down Granoff and Telkedzhiev in the quarters and semis, both bonafide #1’s. Although it’s an obvious over reaction, look for Farrell to have a shot at playing top-3 come spring time.

Worst Result: We’ll stick with the A-flight Singles and look no further than 2 1ST ROUND LOSSES! This in and of itself may be more surprising than most other Panther results. Fall heroes Palmer Campbell and Jackson Frons fell hard in their respective 1st round matches. Campbell fell to Chris Ellis from Bates (#3 in 2013) and Frons was vanquished by McKinley Grimes of RPI. Now, Grimes pushed Carpenter in the quarters so he’s no slouch, but I’m sure that somewhere Brantner Jones saw this result and punched a baby. Both guys were key members in the Panther Final-Four squad from last spring, and will need to step their game up at ITAs in 10 days.

Looking Ahead: Nice up and down performance from the Panthers. Their competition may not have been top-10 teams, but there were definitely a couple of top-20 teams present. We’ll see how many people/teams the Panthers get into ITAs, but that should be a better test for a team hoping to be the class of the region.

D3R grade and quick take: A-

After losing number one Alex Johnston, number two Brantner Jones, and number one doubles player Andrew Lebovitz, among many others, winning 3 of the 6 flights is pretty impressive.  Campbell and Frons losing early is alarming, but Hansen clearly has recruited the freshmen to get the job done.

Lion King Character: Scar (hey man, evil dudes get stuff done)

 

Trinity:

Grade: C-

Best Result: Carpenter making the semifinals before dropping a super-breaker to the eventual champion Smolyar. DC has become a mainstay in these tournaments, and it was no surprise to see him make it to Sunday. While he didn’t have the toughest draw, he did what he had to do before pushing Smolyar to the brink.

Worst Result: Basically everyone else. While I wish I could nominate the whole team, I’m gonna stick to the B-Flight Singles here. I had both Mandel and Matingo going deeper into the tournament than they did, and they disappointed me. Don’t get me wrong, they both lost to good players, but the middle of the lineup needs to be Trinity’s strength this year. Those are matches that both players will need to win come springtime.

Looking Ahead: There was only one other Batam player/team to make the semis, and most fell in the quarters. This was an extremely average result for Coach Assaiante’s bunch. If Trinity is looking to take a step forward this year, and looking at their senior-laden lineup it HAS to be this year, the entire team will need to take its game up a notch.

D3R grade and quick take: C

Trinity was consistently unimpressive, winning a round or two in every flight but failing to make any deep runs.  Very emblematic of pretty much every Trinity season.

Lion King Character: Rafiki (Assaiante…duhhh)

 

Skidmore:

Grade: C+

Best Result: Kit Green-Sanderson running away with the B-Flight Singles title. Not much to discuss here. He had a great tournament, not the first time he’s done well early in the fall.

Worst Result: The doubles. I’m not gonna differentiate between the doubles hardships, because they spell a disturbing trend for the Thoroughbreds. Doubles had become a recent strength in Saratoga Springs, but with the graduation of Sherpa/Knight/Loutsenko the team lost all of their best doubles players. Tong is a sneaky good doubles player, but Skidmore will need to step up their doubles (as will more than ½ of the region) if they’re gonna keep their ranking.

Looking Ahead: It was also a quietly nice tournament for Lucas Pickering, Skidmore’s top recruit (4-star). But while semis of the C-Flight Singles is a nice debut, bigger things are needed from Lucas, along with returning guys like Leung and Swerdlick if the Thoroughbreds are going to win their conference, let alone compete with the regional big-dogs. As of right now, I don’t think Williams would be fearing another rematch with this team.

D3R grade and quick take:  B-

Great run from Sanderson in the B flight, not a whole lot more.  Skidmore looks to be a pretty deep team, but it is unclear if they will have the firepower at the top to compete with higher ranked teams, after losing Loutsenko and Sherpa.

Lion King Character: Zazu

 

Bates:

Grade: B-

Best Result: As per usual the doubles was the strength of the Bobcats. Planche/Ellis winning the A doubles flight. No questions here, clearly the top performance from the Bobcats this weekend. Planche is building off a killer doubles season with Berg, and may have found his new partner.

Worst Result: On the other end, Pierre lost his 1st round singles match (in what must’ve been an absurd battle 6-7, 7-6, 10-8) to Rob Jacobson from Tufts. Jacobson is a very good player, and should play in the top ½ of the lineup for Tufts, but Bates’ newly crowned #1 will need to not only win these matches, but even win matches against a slightly better opponent if Bates is going to contend with the 2nd tier of the NESCAC.

Looking Ahead: Surprise surprise. Bates plays good doubles. Seeing Schwartz retire, and Lee not playing in the singles makes me wonder about their respective injury status. Bates has had injury issues in the past, and will need to do something different to keep players healthy this year. We will learn more about the depth of this team when they host their Invitation later in the fall.

D3R grade and quick take:  C+

An A for doubles, where Planche/Ellis had a great tournament and so did Ordway/Lee.  A D for singles.  ‘Nuff said.

Lion King Character: Ed the Hyena

 

Tufts:

Grade: A

Best Result: The D-Flight Singles. 3 semifinalsts and an all-Jumbo finals should put new Coach Karl Gregor in the enviable position of having a variety of options at the bottom of his lineup.

Worst Result: Gotta be one of the doubles teams I’m going with Jacobson/Gupte getting snarked on by Grimes/Mazzara (who will henceforth be known as Mazz). No really terrible singles results here. Basically all of the Tufts guys in the top 3 flights ended up losing to guys who either won the flight, or finished as a runner-up.

Looking Ahead: This was a very good showing from the Jumbos, and Tufts fans should be very optimistic about this upcoming season. Reports from Jumbo insiders say this team looks ready to challenge for top-3 in the NESCAC. A lineup of Telkedzhiev, Jacobson, Wong, Glickman (who might be abroad?) along with any number of freshmen/vets like Tan/Cary has the nastiness potential that I look for in my sleeper-teams. There’s a long LONG way to go before I’m ready to rule them a challenger for the conference title, but this is a heck of a start. I look forward to writing my Tufts season preview, and who knows, maybe this Jumbo team will be my Wesleyan of 2015.

D3R grade and quick take:  A-

With an old coach gone and former players back in action, Tufts look like they will be a deep, unified bunch this year.

Lion King Character: Simba

 

Brandeis:

Grade: D-

Best Result:  Ummmmm…Brian Granoff second round (win vs. Brandon Mazzara of RPI, loss to Noah Farrell of Midd) or Michael Arguello second round (win vs. Peter Heidrich of Midd, loss to Rohan Gupte of Tufts)

Worst Result: Everything else.  Doubles.

Looking Ahead:  Not giving these guys an F because Arguello and Granoff each grinded out a couple good first round wins.  Now for the negative…doubles was the achilles heel of Deis last year, as they consistently would be down 2-1 against pretty much every ranked team they played.  They played pretty good singles down the stretch but just would consistently lose big at 2 and 3 doubles.  They need to sure this up before the spring and it is clear after this tournament that they have a lot of work to do.  With no one making a run in singles, that is far from a guarantee as well.  The only win by one of their freshman in the entire tournament was Sam Berg in the D flight, so I’m not sure if they will be able to take the next step.  Lamanna’s crew is always a hard-working bunch, so they’ll keep at it, but their talent might just be lacking.

D3NE grade and take: F

Yikes. This is not the way Coach Lamanna wanted his season to start. The Judges went a total of 3-14 over the weekend, and didn’t win a single doubles match. Arguello dropping the superbreaker 15-13 must’ve been brutal, but not having one player advance to Sunday is an even tougher pill to swallow. I’ve heard legend of the Brandeis coaches leaving players at sites before for not-competing/caring (while I doubt this is true, it is something that I would be 100% behind), so I’m scared/excited to see what, if anything happened this weekend. Lamanna and Pandian will undoubtedly right this ship, but the Judges might be further away than some people thought.

Lion King Character: Timon

 

RPI:

Grade: C-

Best Result: McKinley Grimes, second round of A flight, (lost to Dan Carpenter of Trin), and Grimes/Mazzara, second round of the doubles A flight (lost to Heidrich/Frost of Midd)

Worst Result: Sundar Devakottai, Steven Baxter and Alain Grullon all losing in a quick two sets in the B, C, and D flights

Looking Ahead:  RPI looks like they are going to struggle with depth, as Grimes, who played very well at 4 and 5 last year, competed in the A flight.  If Matt LaBarre is around, this team gets much stronger (please let me know if anyone has insight into this).  The fact that nobody made it past the second round means that RPI needs to improve if they hope to make it into the rankings with teams like Trinity, Bates, and Tufts.  In the battle for that coveted Liberty League title, I would place RPI at a similar level with Vassar, with those Skid kids (what name is better, Skid kid or Midd kid?) the big favorites.

D3NE grade and take: C

Ridiculous question. Obviously Midd Kid. There’s a freakin song about it. Anyways, considering this was their 1st time playing in this tournament, RPI’s performance should be put into perspective. The Engineers wouldn’t have even been considered as a possible invite 5 years ago. This is an up-and-coming program who are out to prove that they can hang with the big boys. Unfortunately, I’m not sure they can. As much as I love their women’s team, the fact of the matter is that RPI didn’t have their 1 or 2 from last season. Regier graduated, and LaBarre is nowhere to be seen. In fact, he isn’t even listed on their website. I’m sure D3Regional will do some further investigating, but until we know more, I’m growing less and less excited for RPI’s Liberty League hopes.

Lion King Character: Pumbaa