2015 Women’s Season Preview: #4 Johns Hopkins

Shout-out to all the Women’s writers for getting their previews out before mine!  I’m looking to pay attention to all the details in my first preview, because the Women’s landscape is a notoriously tough audience.  Wink, wink.  I’ll admit that I am doing this preview after my Men’s Emory preview, so hopefully I can keep the creative writing flowing for the women’s side of the business.  Luckily, I have the Johns Hopkins Lady Jays on deck, which should be a pretty interesting team to cover considering their recent success.  I think I even have a few followers on twitter from the team!  Let’s get GLOBAL, people!

Coach: Director of Tennis, Dave Woodring, 5^th Season

Location: Baltimore, MD

Preseason Ranking: #4

Twitter Handle: None – get on this, Hopkins!

Overview

This is my first Women’s Preview article, so if I do make any mistakes, please give me a break!  I’m doing my best over here.  Anyways, I get to start with the Hopkins Lady Jays, who have been a team on the rise for the past few years.  Just about 4-5 years ago, this was a team that was battling in the low single digits and even in the teens.  However, this is a new year, and the Jays are coming off their most successful season to date.  Last year was I believe their best finish in school history, as they finished in 4^th after a tough loss to Williams in the 3^rd place match.  With a great season in tow as well as brand new courts coming this spring, Hopkins has a lot of momentum on which to ride on going into the Spring season.  You’ll also see that these are not the only things that they should be excited about as we begin to see some matchplay starting within the next few weeks.  The Jays have always been a solid all-around team that prides themselves on being able to get points from anywhere in the lineup.  This was a team that was very top-heavy up until a couple years ago when they were able to get significant contributions from the bottom of the lineup.  Kudos to Coach Woodring (or should I say, Director Woodring) for slowly building this team from a solid team into a national contender.  I’ve always seen Woodring as a guy who can really relate to his players while also giving them the constructive criticism they need to improve, and it looks like this team’s improvements have shown that.

Lineup Analysis

This is where things might get a little shady for me, but I’m going to give it my best effort and also use our trusty UTR ratings to help me out a bit as well.

#1 Singles, Ashnaa Rao

Universal Tennis Rating: 9.51

Twitter Handle: @ashhhhhh1995 (really, you needed 6 H’s?)

This one I didn’t even need the Universal Tennis Rating, because Ashnaa Rao has been killing it this past fall.  Did she win the ASouth ITA?  Yes, she did.  Did she win Small College Nationals? Yes, she did.  Is she the #1 player in the nation? Yes, she is.  Rao is officially the favorite for all of her matches unless her luck starts changing, and that’s already something last year’s team couldn’t boast.  Expect Rao to have a huge year this year as she looks to continue her momentum throughout the spring.  She’ll absolutely be a key for this team if they want to get back to where they were last year.

#2 Singles, Amanda Austi

Universal Tennis Rating: 8.43

I’m going a little out of order here in terms of Universal Tennis Rating, but my gut tells me that Austi will be at #2 singles.  Last year, Austi had a fairly strong year at the #1 spot, where she finished off the year by leading the #2 player in the nation (against Williams).  Hopkins now has the strength at the top of the lineup with both Rao and Austi to combat any duo that any other team has.  Although it will probably be disappointing for Austi to play #2 singles after playing the top dog as a freshman, I’m sure that she will continue to improve and fight off a sophomore slump.

#3 Singles, Jody Law

Universal Tennis Rating: 8.58

I’m going with my gut on this one and saying that Jody Law will rise to the #3 spot in the singles lineup.  This is a player who clearly put in a lot of work over the summer and the offseason (and if not, somehow gets better without any practice).  She had a stellar ITA, where she beat her teammate Sydney Lehman (more on her later) in the ITA by the score of 6-2, 6-2.  Law then lost to her teammate Rao in the finals, but overall this was a really strong performance.  There is definitely a lineup where Law can play in the #2 or #4 spot, but as of right now she is my front runner for the #3 singles spot.  With the improvements of Law and Rao this year, Hopkins is looking really strong in the top 4.

#4 Singles, Sydney Lehman

Universal Tennis Rating: 9.23

Despite having the second highest UTR, I have Lehman slated in at #4 singles.  It looks like her teammates have caught up to her a little bit over the summer, and that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.  We’re talking about a top 40 player in the nation last year playing #4 for your team.  Lehman had the goods to make the quarterfinals of the ASouth ITA, until she fell to Law as I mentioned earlier.  She was a legitimate #2 last year, as she went close with CMS, Emory, and Williams to end the year.  Lehman at #4 should be almost an automatic win in the regular season for the Lady Jays.

#5 Singles, Megumi Chen

Universal Tennis Rating: 8.23

This was a tough one to pick for me, but Chen definitely gets the nod at the #5 spot.  Chen had a pretty solid ITA tournament, especially for a bottom of the lineup player.  The freshman came in and beat a pretty good player in Tsu from Carnegie Mellon, and continued on to take out Buell from W&L in the round of 16.  She eventually lost to Pratt from CMU, but that’s a top of the lineup player.  I’ve always been a big fan of freshmen, especially on the women’s side, as they tend to really take DIII by storm when they first arrive.  Chen looks like a solid #5 from here on out.

#6 Singles, Elaine Baik/Stephanie Rettig/Other

Universal Tennis Rating: 7.80, 8.47

If I were a betting man (which I am), I would put money on either Baik or Rettig playing at #6 singles.  They are 2 of the 5 seniors on the team, and Baik actually played at #5 singles last year.  Elaine also had a decent ITA tournament where she ended up losing to a CMU player in the quarterfinals.  QFs for a #6 player… that’s a good tournament.  Rettig, on the other hand, hasn’t gotten much playing time in the past year or so and unfortunately bowed out of ITA with an injury.  She was one of Hopkins better recruits as a freshman, so it will be interesting to see who turns out where in both Baik and Rettig’s last seasons.

Doubles

With all the strength of their singles, doubles actually looks like a potential weakness this year for Hopkins.  They didn’t have a team make the finals of the ITA tournament, and the team of Chen/Lehman did not pose a threat in the semis against a strong Washington and Lee team.  The team of Austi/Rao should definitely be better and I expect they’ll end up at #1 doubles by the end of the year.  Who knows, these might not even be the teams that we see coming out of Baltimore.  Either way, Hopkins needs to figure out what combinations they like and really play off the chemistry that some of these players have together.  If they can find a spot that gets them a guarantee, that would be ideal for the Jays.

The Schedule – Key Matches

As it always does with ASouth matches, Hopkins will be beginning the meat of their season with the Indoor National Championships, hosted by Depauw on the Women’s side.  It looks to me like Hopkins will be playing Depauw to start off the tournament, who will slate in as the #7 seed.  If that’s the case, I like the draw for the Lady Jays as Depauw hasn’t really been a threat to a top 5 team in a long, long time.  On the women’s side, top 5 teams are really expected to make the semifinals of Indoors and anything less than that would be a huge disappointment for the Jays.  However, I see this team making the finals given their strength with a potential showdown with the top dogs, Emory.  Now that will be a HUGE match, and I am definitely looking forward to some fireworks as the Jays try and get some revenge for last year’s semifinal NCAA loss.

The rest of the way is really centered around three big matches for the Jays.  They will play host to Williams on their new home courts.  All of you know the history of the Williams Women’s tennis program, but this will be another revenge match for the Jays.  Since they are essentially going to be locked into NCAAs, I’m hoping they come out firing with nothing to lose against the Ephs as they look to really christen their home courts in a big way.  After that, they’ll be playing Washington and Lee on the road.  Lexington has always been a really tough place to play for men’s and women’s visiting teams alike, as they have a somewhat strange court setup depending on which side you play on.  The Generals are hungry to get back to their glory days and are on the way up this year, so it will be important for Hopkins to take their best shot and send it right back to them.  Last but not least is an annual showdown with Emory on the road.  Again, another tough place to play and this will probably be the Jays biggest challenge.  It will give us a good idea of where this team is leading up to the tournament and what seeding they will be getting.  I hope this team is ready!

After these three big matches, Hopkins will clean up the Centennial Conference tournament.  I have no doubt that they will beat teams like Swarthmore, Washington, etc, and make it to the big dance.  I expect them to make it in with a top 4 seed, but we’ve seen stranger things happen.  As long as they take care of Washington and Lee and Mary Washington with ease, this should be a straight forward season to a top 4 seed for this team.

D3AtlanticSouth’s 3 Keys to Success

1. Doubles – Since I don’t know as much about the Women’s circuit (yet), I’ll only be doing 3 keys to success as opposed to the 5 I do for Men’s. Anyways, I know for a fact that doubles will be the key to the season for Hopkins.  I can’t see more than 2 teams in the nation taking 4 or more singles matches from them, honestly.  Which basically means that if you’re going to beat the Jays, you’re going to have to win doubles and split the singles.  Or, you could roll the dice and hope your singles steps up on the right day.  If I were a coach, I’d be focusing on the first opportunity.  This is a vulnerable team in doubles right now, but if they get it right, they could be a national powerhouse.
2. Sophomore Power – If you didn’t notice, my projected top 3 are all sophomores. Ashnaa Rao and Jody Law have improved greatly since last year, and Austi was a top 10 player last year.  If Hopkins can keep this top 3 for the whole season, this is going to be a ridiculously tough team to beat.  Don’t understate the fact that these girls all came into school together and have a great chemistry with each other.  Remember, this is a team sport, and team bonding counts for a lot.  When your top 3 are friends and leaders, that makes a huge difference for a team as young as this.
3. Do more courts mean better practices? – One of my big questions this year about the Jays on both the Men’s and Women’s sides is what the effect of these new courts will be for the teams. The courts they previously had were so poorly kept that I find it hard to believe it didn’t negatively affect their play.  Now with a whole new complex, there could be a lot of excitement around the program and who knows?  Maybe that excitement will pay off on the practice court and eventually, the match court.  I expect the team to take advantage of their newfound space and utilize it to the best of their abilities.  At the top of the food chain, any advantage matters.  Hopkins could sure use a little advantage here and there.

Conclusion

Yes, I am very positive about this team this year.  When a team steadily improves year after year, that means people in the program are doing it right.  They have three more years left of their mega recruiting class that brought in three potential top 30 players, which very few schools can boast.  Although I think it might be a long shot, I wouldn’t call myself surprised if I saw this team hoisting the trophy at the end of the year.  Hopefully, I don’t jinx them. J  And with that, I’m satisfied.  ASouth, OUT.