2015 Season Preview: The University of the South

Sewanee – The University of the South

Coach: John Shackelford

Location: Sewanee, TN

Preseason ranking: Unranked, #7 regional

For my next regional season preview, we head down south for, naturally, The University of the South! Sewanee (pronounced Swaney, I believe), as it is known, is located in Tennessee, and back in 1932, the University was actually a charter member of the Southeastern Conference, or SEC. After being outscored 1163 to 84 in eight years worth of football games, and never winning a conference game, Sewanee ultimately went on to become a member of the Southern Athletic Association, competing against schools like Hendrix, Rhodes, and Birmingham Southern. Although this conference is not exactly the NESCAC when it comes to tennis prowess, Sewanee has actually managed to become a pretty solid and consistent team, usually ranked around #10 regionally. Last year, they vaulted up the regional rankings, passing Methodist, Christopher Newport, Haverford, Franklin & Marshall, and NC Wesleyan to finish the year at #7. Due to the strength of their conference (or lack thereof), the Tigers will always make the NCAA tournament. However, I know they have their sights set on bigger things, like an NCAA national ranking! Let’s get to know the Tigers, shall we?

Lineup Analysis:

Key Losses: Nobody

Key Additions: Davis Owen (freshman)

Singles:

#1 Singles: Avery Schober (sophomore)

#2 Singles: Rand Jackson: (junior)

#3 Singles: Connor Winkler: (senior)

#4 Singles: Eric Roddy (junior)

#5 Singles: Sean Laughlin (junior)

#6 Singles: Scott Gallimore (sophomore) or Davis Owen

Doubles:

#1 Doubles: Avery Schober (sophomore) and Eric Roddy

#2 Doubles: Connor Winkler and Rand Jackson

#3 Doubles: Niamke Shropshire-Boykin (sophomore) and Davis Owen or Scott Gallimore and Blake Wilde (sophomore)

Schober had a terrific freshman year last year, losing not a single match that I would call a bad loss, and getting several really good wins as well, over Alex Johnston (Midd), Brian Tan (Tufts), Taylor Shamshiri (Washington and Lee). He will lock down that spot again this year. After that, Jackson and Winkler will battle it out for the #2 spot. Both are talented guys who won pretty much every match they should, but lost against every ranked team. Roddy, Laughlin, and Gallimore were a pretty solid 4-6 last year, winning the majority of their matches. Of course, the majority of their matches are also against mediocre competition, but that’s okay! Roddy had the best win of the three, beating Ian Wagner of Emory back in March. It will be interesting to see where Owen fits in there. He won his first round at ITAs, before losing to Wagner 6-1,6-2, so he is definitely in consideration for a starting spot.

I picked the doubles teams based on the four teams that Sewanee had in the doubles draw at ITAs. I like the Schober/Roddy team, as they had a nice tournament, making the semis before falling 8-3 to the champs, Ruderman/Wagner from Emory. Sewanee’s doubles last season was similar to their singles, never winning more than one of the three doubles matches against a ranked squad.

How can they get in the rankings:

Schedule: http://www.sewaneetigers.com/sports/mten/2014-15/schedule

Sewanee has several good opportunities this year to get big wins! It starts in early March, as they make their way to St. Louis to take on Washington U. I wouldn’t give them much of a chance in this one, but then later take on Carnegie Mellon, Redlands, Trinity (CT), and Denison out in Claremont. I actually think that the order of the matches by date is pretty much in order from most to least difficult, as I do not think they will compete with Carnegie, but I think Trinity and Denison are certainly winnable. Washington and Lee will be the big one, on March 22^nd, their chance to move into the top five regionally, as they lost a heartbreaker to them last year, 5-4.

By looking at the box score versus Washington and Lee last season, I think it is really clear what Sewanee needs to do to crack the rankings. They will need spots 2-4 in the lineup to step up big time. Against W&L, Winkler at #2, Jackson at #3, and Roddy at #4 all lost in a quick straight sets. The rest of the match was extremely tight, as Schober at #1, Laughlin at #5, and Gallimore at #6 all grinded out wins in three sets, and the doubles matches were all close. The Tigers are strong at the top and at the bottom, but the middle of this lineup really scares me. Against Trinity (CT), who is strong throughout their lineup and good at doubles, Sewanee will really need to step up against guys like Musyoka Mbithi, Ford Traff, and Ned Mandel. They lost 9-0 to them last season, and the only close match was #1 singles, so Sewanee will have their work cut out for them this offseason. They are a talented bunch, however, so it can be done!

What can keep them from the rankings:

Looking at their results from last year, there is not a lot to make me think they can beat a Trinity, or even a Denison. Their closest match against a top 30 team last year was Tufts, which they lost 5-4. This match, however, also featured the B lineup from the Jumbos, missing Nik Telkedziev, Jay Glickman, Rob Jacobson and Austin Blau. Sure, Sewanee got after it in singles, taking 4 of 6 against the B-teamers, but frankly, they were crushed in doubles, winning 7 games in 3 pro-sets. Against ranked teams last year, sometimes Schober would win and they would steal a doubles match (example, Middlebury), or sometimes, a couple guys lower in the lineup would win matches but everybody else would lose (example, Kenyon). I fear that these guys simply will not all put it together on the same day. I think that any guy in this Tiger lineup is talented enough to win a match against any team outside the top 15. I just do not think that three or four of them can all win on the same day.

Prediction:

I think that this will be an interesting year for Sewanee. They’ll take care of business against every team outside the top 40, as they always do. Washington and Lee will be one heck of a barnburner, and this year, the Tigers will put it together come out on top! With that, they will vault up to the top 5 or 6 in the Atlantic South, really depending on how Swarthmore does this year, since they are #6 at the moment. They will also move to about #35 nationally. However, I think they will drop all of those tough California matches that I outlined above. It is poor scheduling (although probably not the fault of the coaches, just the way it worked out) to put Denison last, and the boys will be tired by that last day after playing Carnegie, Redlands, Trinity in four days, and having Denison the very next day. So, that’s my prediction. I think it will ultimately be a good step forward for the Tigers, and the season after this will be one, if they can bring in some nice recruits, to really watch out for them in the national rankings!