2015 Season Preview: #6 Emory Eagles

While my fellow writers have been churning out previews, I have simply been milling around the DIII world waiting for my next preview.  Luckily for all of you, we have begun our Women’s previews and I will be writing another preview tomorrow on the women’s side.  So much for delegating, eh?  Anyways, it’s my pleasure to be writing my newest Men’s preview, which will be none other than the #6 Emory Eagles.  Emory has consistently been the Atlantic South’s best team for the past umpteen years.  They have another good shot at being the top team in the ASouth again this year as they bring back a solid core of players and of course a coach who knows how to win in John Browning.

Coach: John Browning, 16 years

Location: Atlanta, GA, Home of the Thunder Dome

Preseason Ranking: #6

Twitter Handle: @EUTennis

Overview

Like I said in the introduction, Emory can be described as two things – dominant and consistent.  No argument can be had against a team that has 3 National Championships since 2003, way too many UAA titles, and a program that everyone knows across the country.  Despite falling in the UAA last year to an upstart CMU team, this is still a team that made the Elite 8 and ended up in the top 6 in the country.  Just think, that’s basically a down year for the Eagles.  The past two years have actually been disappointing from an Eagles standpoint, but I personally think they are poised to do big things this year.  Emory is well-known for being extremely competitive and fiery on the court, and that’s not a bad thing at all.  This is a team that knows how to win.  With a ton of playoff and champion experience, I will most likely be drinking the Kool-Aid as I always do with this team.  Will a third year of “underachievement” be in the works, or will the season be considered a “comeback” year for a program used to being in the National Championship conversation?  There will be a lot of scrutiny regarding Emory around the blog as there always is, and I’m sure people will be questioning my opinions as I am a notorious ASouth homer, as I should be.

Lineup Analysis:

#1 Singles, Alex Ruderman – Last year, Ruderman entered the season as a relative unknown at the #1 spot, considering he had barely played at that spot in the lineup before.  Well, he took DIII by storm by being arguably a top 3 player in the nation.  Despite a disappointing (by his standards) performance at the NCAA Individuals, Ruderman has not let up this year.  He won the ITA tournament for his region this year, mostly running through his teammates in an annual fall Emory tournament.  At Small College Nationals, Alex lost to both Chua of Chicago and Krull of Trinity TX and ended up finishing 6^th in the tournament.  Again, a tough couple of losses for the senior, but Ruderman has a history of improving his play throughout the year.  Expect to see him excel at the #1 position with his grinding style and especially at the end of the year when some other players may be getting worn out.

#2 Singles, Eric Halpern – Luckily for me, the top spots in the Emory lineup are basically set in stone.  #2 singles will almost absolutely be occupied by Halpern.  I’m sure Halpern is always itching to get that #1 spot back and that’s a positive for Emory.  If I were to describe his year last year, I’d say it was an above average year.  From Halpern’s standards, it probably was a mediocre one.  I know the kid strives for perfection and I’m sure he’s looking to get close to an undefeated season this year.  With a backhand that is one of the most feared in DIII, Halpern can go toe to toe with any baseliner and follows that up with a great all around game.  Don’t forget to mention his competitive fire and the all-encompassing senior factor either.

#3 Singles, Rafe Mosetick – There’s no secret to Rafe’s game at this point.  The guy can grind with the best of the best, and he’s going to bring a fire that is hard to match at the #3 singles spot.  If you aren’t mentally ready to play against Rafe, you’ll lose fairly quickly no matter what game style you play.  That doesn’t mean he’s unbeatable though.  He had a rough patch last year when he lost consecutive matches to Wash U, Bowdoin, and GAC.  The guy can be beaten.  But don’t forget when he beat Geier, Brown, Hu, and Klawitter to close out the season when his team needed it the most.   With the combination of Ruderman, Halpern, and Mosetick at the top spots, we can expect Emory to be in almost every match this year barring injury or really poor play.  That’s really all you can ask for.

#4 Singles, Ian Wagner – Rounding out the clear top 4 is Ian Wagner, who happened to finish 3^rd/4^th in the ITA tournament, where he lost to his teammate Halpern.  Again, not surprising.  Emory clearly benefits from having four guys who theoretically play the #1 or #2 spots in the lineup.  However, Wagner is the most prone to up and down play.  He suffered a few head scratching losses last year, but I guess that’s something you expect from college players.  He really only lost a couple of times at the #4 and most of those losses were in close, three set matches.  Wagner is a top 5 #4 player in the nation, and I’d hang my hat on that for the rest of the season.

#5 Singles, Will Adams – Last year’s #6 player for Emory is now slated to move up in the lineup at the #5 spot.  While this might be a worrying move for some other #6 players, I don’t think that Adams will have that much trouble at his new spot in the lineup.  He had 4 losses last year, all to ranked teams, and 3 of them were in three sets.  He’s well known for playing high-octane and high emotion matches, so a move up in the lineup probably won’t be that hard a transition in terms of high-pressure play.  I’d probably describe Adams as a “gamer.”  However, it’s clear the blueprint to beat Emory right now is to try and take advantage of both doubles and potentially the bottom of the lineup.  You can steal a match or two at the top, but show me a team that will confidently come in and take 3 of 4 from those guys.  I doubt it.  Adams will be a key for Emory, and potentially be the difference between a top 4 team and a top 8 team at the end of the year.

#6 Singles, Scott Rubenstein/Arman Manji – #6 singles will be the question mark for Emory this year, but they have a pair of freshmen I think will be more than capable of handling the position.  Manji (I believe that’s how to spell it) is some of the bloggers’ front runner to take the last spot, and I do think that he may be the guy to step up.  His loss to Halpern in ITA was really impressive, but you all know that inter-team matches always pose a lot of variability when it comes to results.  His teammate and fellow freshman, Scott Rubenstein, also had a good tournament where he ended up losing to Ruderman in the quarterfinals.  So right now, there really isn’t much to go off of, but my bet on the year is Manji.

Doubles – This is how teams are going to beat the Eagles this year.  I’ve said it for a while now.  Despite being an extremely strong singles team, Emory has had their fair share of struggles in doubles the past few years and that has kept them from going farther than the Elite 8 in the NCAA tournament.  CMU beat them in UAAs last year by sweeping them in doubles.  Kenyon gave them a scare in the Sweet 16 by taking 2 of 3 from them.  This was the formula last year, and it will be the formula this year.  They’ve lost a few doubles specialists from last year but who knows which newcomers will emerge for them.  Emory currently has Ruderman/Wagner set at #1 doubles, as they notched a 5^th place finish in the Small College Nationals.  After that, it’s a load of question marks as Emory will most likely have an unknown #2 team and a team of Halpern/Mosetick at #3 doubles.  We’ll see how that strategy works for them this year, but overall it is definitely a lineup that has an opportunity to get swept on a given day.

The Schedule – Key Matches

Consistent with my other previews, I’m not going to be going through match by match and giving you predictions that I’ll be giving you later on in the year.  I’ll simply go through the big matches and what to expect if Emory is going to have a successful year.  Looking at Emory’s schedule, it’s definitely a very boom or bust type deal.  Their first big set of matches will come at none other than Indoor Nationals, which happens to be in a little more than a month.  The first team they’ll play is none other than Carnegie Mellon, who left a sour taste in their mouth after UAAs last year.  This has now become a MASSIVE match in terms of the Pool C, as it looks like the UAA will potentially only get 3 or 4 teams in instead of the potential 5 they could’ve gotten.  With the rise of Case and Chicago, the Emory/CMU matchup features the two favorites (in my eyes) to make the tournament.  Win this match and you get a huge leg up on the Pool C contenders.  You’ll see why this match is so important for the Eagles later on.  As it was for CMU, Emory should most likely be happy with a finish within the top 4 (Wash U, Trinity TX, Hopkins are the other top teams) and should be disappointed in a below top 4 finish.

As I looked at the rest of the schedule, I was very surprised.  Emory will be taking their spring break talents to Hawaii this year, where they will play a total of… 0 DIII competitors.  They get a really good set of DI and other division competitors where they can enjoy their break and also get some good tennis in, but wow.  It’s definitely a risk that they play no other DIII teams over the break.

Later on, the Eagles only have Middlebury left on the schedule in terms of true competitors (not counting NCW, Tufts, and Skidmore). Middlebury becomes their other most important match of the year, as a win against them would solidify their chances to make Pool C.  This is also a huge match for the UAA, as Middlebury could drop below many of the UAA competitors with a loss here.  After facing off versus Midd, they’ll go to the annual UAA tournament where they will most likely be in the 2/3 spot.  That means a likely date with CMU, which will be a great rematch for us to watch.  It may not mean anything at that time if both teams have good seasons, but it will be a pleasure as seeding will be decided for NCAAs.

D3AtlanticSouth’s 5 Keys to Emory’s Season

1. Preparation for Big Matches – Like I briefly mentioned in the Schedule Analysis, there are maybe 5 big matches that Emory will play this year. As we saw last year, anything can really happen at the top of the DIII circuit.  With the rule changes in Pool C this year, a team that we had previously considered a lock to make the tournament is suddenly on the border of getting in.  That’s because everyone is on the border of getting in.  Emory has a lot of weeks to prepare for Indoors and also their big match against Middlebury.  Win these two matches (CMU and Midd) and you basically declare yourself into the NCAA tournament.  Lose one of them and you’re suddenly in the jumble that is the Pool C formula.  Preparation for these matches will be huge and I’m sure Coach Browning will have these guys prepared.
2. Doubles… duh – Doubles cannot rear it’s ugly head for the Eagles this year. If they are complacent finishing in the top 8, then they can afford to go down in doubles.  However, you’re not going to beat the CMS’s and Wash U’s of the world if you go down 2-1 or 3-0 in doubles. It’s just the name of the game and everyone in DIII knows it.  Emory needs to find solid contributors at every doubles position, something that has eluded them since the Pottish/Goodwin days.  Can they find a nice combo for their always questionable #2 and #3 spots?  Can Ruderman/Wagner be rocks at the top of the lineup while also keeping up their singles prowess?  This is one of the biggest keys to Emory’s season as they hope to get back to being Emory.
3. The Fantastic Four – I’ve made a big deal about Emory’s top of the singles lineup, and for good reason. When your strengths don’t turn out to be strengths, that really hurts the whole team (obviously).  Want to know a cool stat?  When Emory lost more than 1 match in the top 4 last year against ranked teams, they went 1-3.  Their only win was against Kenyon.  Their three regular season losses (Wash U, Johns Hopkins, CMU) all came when they split the top 4 matches or were down.  That’s not a coincidence.  Emory’s bottom and doubles is not strong enough to pick up a weak performance from the top guys.  They need the top 4 of Ruderman, Halpern, Mosetick, and Wagner to really come to play every match.
4. Seniors! – The best part of this team that I actually haven’t mentioned yet is not only the amount of senior leadership, but the type of senior leadership that this team could get. Ruderman, Halpern, and Wagner are all seniors and play at the top of the lineup.  All 3 have won a national championship.  Will the team rally around them and try to get them that championship to ride off into the sunset?  We’ve seen upper classmen propel their teams to greater things than their talent would say they achieve.  If that’s the case with this team, we might be looking at a championship contender.  If not, we’re looking at a team that can give a championship contender a scare.
5. Know Your Place – Let’s face it, Emory isn’t the favorite to win the championship this year. They haven’t been ever since Goodwin and Pottish left.  This year, this team will need to embrace the fact they have to always work harder than the next guy to even have a chance at the ship.  If the players embrace this mentality and give it their all, we could see a Cinderella story in NCAAs.  Who would have thought we would be talking about the Eagles and Cinderella stories?  It’s time to put up or shut up for this experienced Eagles team.

Conclusion

With only a few interesting matches on the schedule, every Emory match is going to be a huge event.  I’ll be covering all of them for sure.  I’m excited to see what happens at Indoors and I am hopeful I can witness what will most likely be a slugfest in the first round with two of my best regional teams.  Will Emory go back to being the bad boys of Browning and regain their swagger?  Only time (and a couple of matches) will tell.