I’m baaaaaaaaack, this time with my second preview of the week (shoutout to Northeast) and my second Women’s preview of the year. I’ve been trying to do my studying up on all the women’s teams in my region, and I must say the ASouth Women’s region as a whole is a bit deeper and more exciting than their men’s counterparts. Next up on my self-made schedule are the Washington and Lee Lady Generals. After getting my feet wet with a top team in my region, it’ll be nice to see how I do with a team that finished in the teens last year. I know this is a pretty active team on Twitter so I hope I get my facts straight and keep my writing interesting! Here goes nothing.
Coach: Erin Ness, 3rd Season
Location: Lexington, VA
Preseason Ranking: #20
Twitter Handle: @WLUWomensTennis
Overview
Washington & Lee is a great example of how programs have to go through their cycles, no matter what team they are. This was a team that maybe 3-4 years ago was a national title contender, a perennial top 5 team, and a team no one wanted to face. Blessed with amazing facilities, a splendid location, and a great talent base, this team actually reached two straight national championships in 2007 and 2008, winning the former. Since then, they have only reached the Elite 8 once (2011) but have been fairly competitive. They brought in their current coach, Erin Ness, for the 2013 season to really jump start their program and get back on track. It looks like they still have some ways to go to get back to their glory days. I do believe the process has already started, and this is absolutely a big year for this team. They will need some development from their up and coming players as they prepare to lose a few big seniors after this year. I’m definitely rooting for them, because let’s be honest, the ASouth is more fun when the Generals are competing at the top of the region.
Lineup Analysis
#1 Singles, Sonja Meighan
Universal Tennis Rating: 9.17
One of the big question marks of the year for the Generals is how Meighan will play this spring. She ended the year as a top 5 player in the nation, and I’m sure she wants to go out as a senior repeating that feat. If she is able to play at that level, this will give the Generals a fighting chance every time out at both #1 singles and doubles, which is huge for a team that needs all the wins it can get. The one funny thing that I just noticed is that it looks like Meighan and Kirkland (later mentioned) took off the singles portion of the ITA to play the doubles tournament. I’m not sure what the thinking is behind that, but it’s a really interesting decision. I seriously hope it’s not because Coach Ness didn’t trust in the conditioning of potentially her two best players.
#2 Singles, Brooke Donnelly
Universal Tennis Rating: 9.03
If Sonja Meighan is the present of Generals tennis, Brooke Donnelly can be considered the future. Although finishing at #4 singles last year, I do think she has taken a step up since her freshman campaign, which really showed in this fall’s ITA. She was able to give the eventual Small College champion Ashnaa Rao a huge scare by bringing her to three sets. This is one of the best results against Rao this year, and I’m going to take a bet and say that Donnelly will rise to the challenge and become the #2 player in Lexington. If she can take sets off the best players of the nation, there is absolutely potential for her to be a strong #2. Let’s hope she continues her momentum from the fall ITA and becomes a legit 1-2 punch with Meighan at #1.
#3 Singles, Meghan Buell
Universal Tennis Rating: 7.58
Despite a somewhat disappointing UTR, Buell is my choice to slot in at the #3 spot for the Generals. She had a tough year at #2 last year, as she lost to a few teams that were ranked in the top 25. I didn’t really see a top notch win on her schedule despite playing at #1 for a few matches as well. That being said, Buell doesn’t need to be a top 2 player this year if she’s slated at #3 singles. With her senior experience and a notch down in the lineup, I could see this year being a nice comeback year for her. This is where the rise of Donnelly can really help this team, because if Buell needs to step in at #2, there may be some trouble. At #3, you can reasonably expect her to be in most of her matches.
#4 Singles, Patricia Kirkland
Universal Tennis Rating: 9.40
Yep, you read that UTR right. Kirkland is currently W&L’s highest rated player on the UTR tennis scale, albeit with only 10% reliability. The reason why this is happening is because of a couple of things. Kirkland did not play too many matches last year in the singles lineup, but when she did, she won. Additionally, she did not play singles in this year’s ITA, which is a strange decision considering she played doubles. If she’s simply not good enough to play in the lineup, that would be a huge surprise to me. It looked like Kirkland was a legit #3 player last year, so it would be shocking to see her not in lineup. Let’s chalk this one up to injury/decision until we get some more information. Kirkland has a lot of talent and is also part of the senior class, so it will be an important year for her as I’m sure she wants to finish out strong. Again, as mentioned in Meighan’s write-up, I really hope this isn’t a conditioning issue.
#5 Singles, Michelle Fleenor
Universal Tennis Rating: 8.24
Fleenor breaks the string of seniors coming in at #5, and I really don’t think anyone else will be playing this position in the lineup come spring. Fleenor is the lone freshman I have starting in the lineup, and rewarded her coach for having her in ITAs by having a good tournament. She was able to make the round of 16, which is an impressive feat for a player that wasn’t playing college tennis last year. Unfortunately for her, she ran into the red hot Rao and ended up losing in straight sets. That being said, that could be the resume of an average to above average #5 player. The Generals are banking on a lot of risky moves, and they are really hoping that Fleenor becomes a solid bottom of the lineup player.
#6 Singles, Allison Hupalo/Claudia Kesala/Other
Universal Tennis Rating: N/A
Washington and Lee definitely sees a decent dropoff from their #5 to their #6 player, where they will probably be testing out a lot of different players throughout the year. I’d expect them to play the hot hand or whoever is giving it their all in practice. A formula like that could mean that senior Allison Hupalo becomes the steady #6 player. Or, Coach Ness can go with a youth movement and throw one of her freshmen (Kesala, Kochard, Zidell) into the mix. It will be interesting to see where Coach Ness goes with this position and she needs to run a fine line between getting her seniors playing time and getting these freshmen some more experience. Either way, this could be a bumpy road for the #6 players, but it could be a surprise at the end of the year with a strong contestant.
Doubles
If there is one thing that Washington and Lee really prides itself on, it’s doubles. This year will most likely prove no different as the team of as the senior duo of Kirkland and Meighan won their second iTA championship. They moved onto Small College Nationals where they placed second, which matches their performance from last year. This is one of the best teams in the nation and potentially the best team on any given day. It’s good to have a team at the top, and it’s good to know they aren’t alone. Their teammates Donnelly and Buell came in second at the ITA, losing to the #1 team. It sucks that we couldn’t see both teams make the Fall Nationals, but what can you do. This was a pleasant surprise for the Generals and they can argue that they have the best 1-2 punch in doubles right now. No matter who ends up being matched at #3, doubles will be the name of the game for W&L this season.
Schedule Analysis – Key Matches
Washington and Lee always has a stacked schedule. Year in and year out, they are able to schedule at least 4-5 ranked teams while also getting a big tournament under their belt. They somehow made Indoors this year despite being the #20 team in the nation. With this comes the fact they are huge underdogs against any team they face. Depauw is the lowest ranked team ahead of them and they are in the 10-15 range. Washington and Lee can be really happy with getting anything 7th and above from this tournament. Indoors is truly a no-lose situation for this team.
Moving to the meat of the schedule, they’ll have some conference opponents before getting into some ranked teams grills. They’ll host Williams on March 24th, which I’m sure will be a nice little wake up call. They also end up hosting Depauw and Emory, who are both top 15 teams in the nation. If they can take one of these three matches (most likely Depauw), I’d consider that a huge success. Later on in the year, they take on another set of top teams in Carnegie Mellon, Johns Hopkins, and Sewanee. The Sewanee match is a must win for respect reasons, but they’ll really have to pull a rabbit out of the hat for that request.
Either way, the Gennies will win their conference and move on. It all depends where they are placed in NCAAs to see how far they can get. It will be interesting, because they have a lot of chances to move up in the rankings. They really just need one or two big wins to get back to #2 seed level and have a shot at one of these lower one seeds. If they can get that, they could absolutely make it back to the Elite 8 and send the seniors off with a nice farewell.
D3ASouth’s 3 Keys to Success
- Stay Healthy and fit! – With so many variables on this team, I can’t tell you how important it is for this team to stay healthy. The decision to take Kirkland and Meighan out of singles was a really interesting decision. As I mentioned, fitness is important and I feel that the ITA really teaches a lot of players the importance of being able to grind out wins. These two are leaders of the team, so they will be counted on for two wins each against the top teams. Are they up for the task?
- Starting at the Bottom? – The biggest question mark for the Generals is definitely the bottom of the singles and doubles lineup. They have four players that they can most likely count on to show up every day, but the rest is debatable. The freshman Fleenor can really give this team a huge boost by being a solid #5. Whoever plays at #6 can do the same if they become a consistent contributor. I can’t tell you how important it is not to have a position that their teammates count as a guaranteed loss. It’s worth so much more than 1 point.
- If anything, do it for the seniors – Can this team pull together for their potentially four senior starters? I see this a lot over on the Men’s side, but I’m not sure how much of an impact senior leadership applies on the women’s side. I actually believe more in freshmen on the women’s side, but whatever. It’s a nice story to have contributing players at the top of the lineup that are upperclassmen. It’s important for Coach Ness to get the team on the same page to instill some core competencies with her younger players. That starts with your captains and seniors.
Conclusion
Phew! What a whirlwind of an article and I’m glad I was able to get something done in one night for once. The Generals can really surprise some people this year, but everything needs to fall into place for them to break back into the top 15. I think they can do it, as they seem to be on the right track. But, I’ve been wrong before. Let’s just see what happens. ASouth, OUT.
Nice review. I appreciate your insights. You really build anticipation for the season and the important matches of the Spring. Keep it up!