New England ITA Preview

Happy Wednesday, boys and girls. The ITAs are the best time of the fall from a tennis perspective, and there is no tournament field deeper than the New England ITA. Boasting the top nine teams in the region, and five of the top eight in the country, this is hands down the most talented ITA in DIII. The tournament will be played at Middlebury starting on Friday morning, which means there are nine outdoor courts on the campus, a few down at the high school, and at least four indoor courts. The weather looks to be cooperative, and you might even get a nice fall weekend (highs in the low 60’s and mostly sunny). Some teams have already played at Midd this fall in their annual Invitational, some teams have one or two matches under their belts, some teams have played some non-DIII competition, and some teams will be getting their first dose of 2017-2018 match action. Let’s break this beast of a tournament.

THE TOP CONTENDERS:

1. Lubo Cuba (Junior, Middlebury, UTR=13.34): The defending champ, the reigning NCAA singles champ, the reigning NCAA dubs champ, do I even need to write the little blurb. He’s the favorite. Nuff said. He looked human last weekend winning the semis and finals of the A-Flight in superbreakers (over the No. 6 and No. 3 seeds in this tournament.) Playing deep into both tournaments could actually play against Lubo, especially given that he’s playing at home with all the distractions that come with sleeping in your dorm room on a Friday and Saturday night. He also does not have a very easy draw for the number one overall seed, and his half of the draw seems much tougher than the bottom half, but to pick against him would be picking an upset.

2. 

   Steven Chen (Senior, Wesleyan, UTR=12.44): Lubo’s top competitor is probably Mr. Martina Hingis himself. His in-region record last year was 12-4 with three of the four losses coming IN THE FALL. That’s right, the only time Chen lost a regional match last spring was when he fell to Cuba 6-3 in the 3rd set. We know he’s playing at his usual high level right now, as he’s coming off an A-Flight tournament win against D1 competition. If Cuba is the odds on favorite to win it all, Chen is the next man up, and I like those odds, especially in what seems to be the weaker half of the draw.

3. Ben Rosen (Senior, Bates, UTR=12.65): Realistically, Chen is more like 2A and Rosen 2B in terms of who poses the biggest threat to Cuba. However, Rosen’s draw is tough from the start (see more later in the article). If he gets past the 5-star Amherst freshman in the 1st round, he’ll likely take on the big-hitting Alex Taylor (Williams), then a total grind with Kyle Wolfe (or Van der Geest or Finkelman, neither of whom would be THAT much easier). After that, all Rosen would have to worry about is the combo of De Quant and Cuba and poof he’s in the finals, NO BIG DEAL. Like Chen, we know Rosen is playing well right now, coming off a big weekend where he beat Farrell in straight sets and sent Cuba to 10-8 in a super. Three really good players, all with a ton of big-match experience, all playing good tennis right now. It’s gonna be a fun weekend!

THE SECONDARY CONTENDERS:

1. Noah Farrell (Junior, Middlebury, UTR=13.31…as of a year ago): THE 2ND RETURN OF THE NIGHT KING! Noah Farrell is back like he never ever left in the first, but just how much rust lingers is still TBD. He ran past a couple talented but erratic players in Kogan (Brandeis) and Koulouris (Skid) before falling relatively easily to Ben Rosen. It was an encouraging weekend for Farrell’s first DIII action in a year, but still left a little to be desired. He should be able to get through to the 3rd round without too much trouble, but DeMendiola (Babson) will provide a test there. Once you make the 3rd round, there’s no such thing as a simple match, and if Noah makes it that far his fitness will really be put to the test. If Farrell is still alive come Sunday, the rest of DIII will tremble at just how good Midd could be.
2. William De Quant (Senior, Middlebury, UTR=12.97): Somehow, Midd’s projected #3 player is the No. 6 overall seed! That’s insanity, but also totally justified. De Quant was an astounding 15-3 in the regular season with his only losses coming to Urken (see below), Reid (a bonafide #1) and Fagundes (also a #1). He had wins over Jemison, Al Houni, Morkovine, Grodecki, and more. He looked good last weekend at the Midd tournament, where he rolled over a couple younger players from Brandeis and Bates before taking the first set from Cuba and losing the 2nd in a breaker, and dropping the subsequent super. He has a potentially tough 1st round match with Larry Zhao (Bowdoin freshman), and possibly Cam Daniels in the 2nd, but look for De Quant to be around late into the weekend.

3. 

   Grant Urken (Junior, Bowdoin, UTR=12.70): Bowdoin’s highest seeded player was actually their #2 last year. However Urken made a deep run at NCAAs, and earned the No. 4 overall seed at this weekend’s tournament. Urken’s leap from unbeatable #6 to excellent #2 players last year was one of the biggest in the country. I can’t wait to see how he follows it up.

4. Luke Tercek (Senior, Bowdoin, UTR=12.02): The senior with a tendency to serve and volley, and the second of the Terk/Urk team has made a deep run in this tournament before, making the finals as a sophomore before falling to Noah Farrell. LT Jr. has one of the easier portions of this draw (shoutout to Scotty Altz and his win over Kyle Wolfe last year!), although that’s not worth a whole lot once you get past the first round. Tercek had his ups and downs last spring as Bowdoin’s top guy, but he’s certainly a threat to be playing on Sunday, in both draws.

DONT SLEEP ON

1. Zach Bessette (Junior, Amherst, UTR=12.13): Bessette is the only Amherst upperclassmen entered into the singles draw. He played #1 for almost the entire spring, and had some good wins along with plenty of losses against the best players in the country. Like the man below him on this list, Zach got much better between his freshman and sophomore seasons. If he’s taken another leap, he should be primed to make a run this weekend.

2. 

   Tyler Barr (Junior, MIT, UTR=12.50): Has Tyler taken another leap? He was very good as a freshman, but even better as a sophomore, making NCAAs in the 11th hour. He earned a top-8 seed for this tournament, and has arguably the easiest section of the draw. But when a possible third-round matchup looms with younger brother, nothing is easy.

3. Brian Grodecki (Senior, Williams, UTR=12.31): One of the trio of Eph captains this year, BG will be looking to put a stamp on his Williams career. He’s looked solid in wins over Vassar and Springfield this fall, and should be ready to go out there and grind. He has a tough draw with a resurgent Win Smith (Wes) in the 1st round, and a possible meeting with either Hillis (Amherst) or Cheng (MIT) in the 2nd round, but we know he has the stamina to make a run here. He also did some really cool stuff over the past couple summers.

FRESHMEN

Austin Barr (Williams): I really wanted to put Lil’ Barr on the don’t sleep on list, as I believe Barr will turn into the best player in this NE freshman class, but I didn’t want to write about him twice. He looked pretty darn good in his two opening matches, dropping two total games against Springfield and Vassar. He has a potential 2nd round match with #9-16 seed Zain Ali (Tufts senior), but if he gets through that, and the fates are with us, we have the potential for the 3rd round Barr-Mitzvah, when young Austin would take on his older brother Tyler from MIT.

Sean Wei/Ethan Hillis/Kevin Ma (Amherst): You can’t just choose one of Amherst’s vaunted freshman class, given how important they will be to the team this year, and that this will be our first time seeing them in action. Wei is a 5-star recruit, but has the unenviable task of taking on No. 3 seeded Ben Rosen in the first round. Even unluckier than drawing the #3 seed would be Kevin Ma, who will be taking on the top overall seed and reigning ITA/National Champion in Lubo Cuba. Comparatively, young Ethan looks like he got the break of a lifetime by taking on Victor Cheng, but Cheng is a tough out as well.

Andrew Finkelman (Wesleyan): We saw a little bit of Finkelman at Quinnipiac last weekend, but other than a mental battle against a cramping opponent, we haven’t seen all that much of Wesleyan’s most highly touted recruit for 2018. Fink takes on Nate Lookwhy, a junior from Gordon College in the 1st round, and if he gets by the Fighting Scott, he will have to play the winner of the Wolfe/Van der Geest matchup in the 2nd round.

Larry Zhao (Bowdoin, UTR=11.63): This will be our first glimpse of Zhao, since Bowdoin hasn’t played any sort of matches yet. The Canadian has a tough first round matchup with Will De Quant. While it would certainly be an upset for Zhao to win, how he competes against an All-American senior who is playing in his final ITA on his home courts could say a lot about the mental capacity of this young freshman, and whether or not he is ready to immediately contribute to the Polar Bear lineup.

We will also get major looks at guys like Anupreeth Coramutla/Nikhil Das (Brandeis), Boris Sorkin (Tufts), Calvin Chung (Williams), Justin Wang (Bowdoin), and many more who are trying to make their first or second impression on their coaches, teammates, fans, and bloggers alike.

ABSENCES

LIKELY ABROAD: Alex Cauneac (MIT), Jerry Jiang (Bowdoin), Deepak Indrakanti (Williams), Jesse Levitin (Amherst: All four guys are juniors, and all are known for being good sports so I hope that all three are simply living it up abroad as juniors and will be back to us come springtime.

LIKELY INJURED: Rohan Gupte (Tufts), Tiago Eusebio/Princeton Carter (Wesleyan): Gupte was in the original draw, as a #9-16 seed, but it looks like he has been replaced by Danny Coran in the updated version of the draw. Eusebio is recovering from a back injury, and I’m not sure why Hurricane Carter is out, but similarly to those abroad, I hope all three get well soon and are back in their lineups by March.

OTHER: Jayson Fung/Gabe Owens (Amherst), Andre Xiao (Middlebury): This is the most interesting category. While Marchalik has officially transferred to Georgetown, and there are strong rumors that Burney has left Herst as well, there hasn’t been anything quite as strong with regards to fellow sophomores Jayson Fung and Gabe Owens. Both guys were starters last year, and Fung was a part of one of the best doubles teams in the country. As we’ve said over and over, the Amherst lineup hasn’t been updated yet, and until that point we just won’t know exactly who is and who isn’t still on the team. But the absence of Fung and Owens from the ITA isn’t good news for Mammoth fans. Less drama for Andre Xiao, but the heralded freshman will not be participating in the singles draw of the ITA. This is likely because Midd is very deep, and with Vanezis and Van der Geest coming off great tournaments, they simply edged out Xiao for the final two singles spots.

WHAT ARE THE MOST INTRIGUING 1ST ROUND MATCHUPS?

#9-16 Kyle Wolfe (Bowdoin) vs Timo van der Geest (Middlebury): Senior on senior action, two guys who have plenty of experience with each other, and TVG seems like he’s playing some of the best tennis of his career, coming off a B-Flight tournament win at Middlebury last weekend. If TVG keeps it going and takes down the uber-consistent Wolfe, that will go a long ways in silencing one of the few flaws people are finding with this year’s Panther squad. Wolfe probably has the toughest draw of any of the seeds in this whole tournament, but I guarantee you he’ll go grind with everybody he plays.

#3 Ben Rosen (Bates) vs Kevin Wei (Amherst): Like Van der Geest, Rosen is coming off a great tournament, where he beat Farrell and lost 10-8 in a superbreaker to Cuba. He was awarded the No. 3 overall seed at the tournament, but his reward was not so fun, a first round date with 5-star recruit Kevin Wei who had some excellent summer results. Rosen is still certainly the favorite, but this one could feature some fireworks.

Victor Cheng (MIT) vs Ethan Hillis (Amherst): I like this matchup a lot and there are a lot of parallels between these two players. Cheng wasn’t the highest recruit MIT has had in past years, and though he had a great year was slightly overshadowed by guys like Barr and Ko. Hillis wasn’t the 5-star recruit that Wei was, but there are multiple coaches who vouched for his work ethic and expect big things from the young man. The winner of this one will likely get Williams #1 Brian Grodecki in the 2nd round, so let’s hope they haven’t used up all their energy.

Calvin Chung (Williams) vs Nathan Kaplan (Amherst): Kaplan is one of only two returning Amherst players entered in the singles draw. He was arguably the Mammoths’ most successful starter last year, racking up win after win at the bottom of the lineup. Chung looks to do something similar for the Ephs this year, and has started off with a bang, losing only one total game between his two matches at #5 against Vassar and Springfield. These two guys could very easily end up squaring off multiple times throughout their career.

DOUBLES

I won’t speculate very much about the doubles side of things, I do think there are a couple of important notes from the draw.

1. The top two teams are really good. Cuba/De Quant and Taylor/Grodecki both have a full year of playing together, both have NCAA experience, and both made the finals of last years NCAA Doubles tournament. It would be a major upset (although it is doubles) if at least one of these teams didn’t make the finals.
2. Don’t sleep on DeMendiola/Rosenbluth and Schlanger/Van der Geest. The #6 and #8 seeds both have some experience playing together. The Babson pair played together last year, and Schlanger and Van der Geest are coming off an A-Flight tournament win at Midd last weekend where they beat Cuba/De Quant in the semis.
3. Even with a couple heavy favorites, there is a lot up for grabs in this tournament. It looks like Bates got the #4 seed out of respect for the doubles that the program plays, but I don’t know if Rosen and Leiner have ever played together. Sorkin replaced Gupte as a part of the #5 overall team from Tufts, Barr and Zhao have never played together at the #7 seed. There are plenty of potential upsets out there!

PREDICTIONS

I’m always wrong with my ITA predictions, but it’s what the people want…

Singles Semis: #6 De Quant def #1 Cuba, #2 Chen def #5 Farrell

Singles Final: #2 Chen def. #6 De Quant

Doubles Semis: #1 Cuba/de Quant def. #6 DeMendiola/Rosenbluth & #2 Taylor/Grodecki def. Bessette/Ma,

Doubles Final: #2 Taylor/Grodecki def. #1Cuba/De Quant

If you’re interested in more ITA coverage, we have/will have previews for all 9 ITAs up on The Blog though the week leading up to the tournaments, and follow your regional writers (or all of us) on Twitter for updates through the weekend. I’ll be back next week to recap this tournament and talk about what we learned from the best fall weekend in DIII tennis. Also, if you’ve made it this far, you really love The Blog, so please consider donating! We have a new donation box in the top left corner of the homepage, and we’ll use the money to make improvements to the site, offer prizes to readers, and motivate the ever-growing writing staff. We really appreciate it, and happy ITAs!