As the leaves begin to change in the South while everything else begins to ice over anywhere North of the Mason Dixon, we bloggers head into hibernation and start grinding out your season preview articles! I’m going to quickly inset a shameless plug right here, but in order to keep us going in the off season, donations are always more than welcome! You can donate by hitting the button on the left side of your screen! Alright, I promise I won’t mention that again for at least another month. ANYWAYS, I am going to kick off my RegASouth previews with Washington and Lee. This team made solid strides in the right direction last season, brought in a nationally ranked recruiting class and will look to continue to build off of these things this season. Let’s do this!
Location: Lexington, VA
Coach: Dave Detwiler (19th season)
ITA National Ranking: TBD
ITA Regional Ranking: TBD (Atlantic South)
Blog Power Ranking: TBD (Hopefully not for long @D3ASouth)
Power 6 UTR: 65
Twitter Handle: @wlumenstennis
Key Departures: March Zheng, Charlie Kittredge, Thomas Harmon, Michael Lukas
Key Additions: Alex Fedor (3 Star/10.64 UTR), Bobby Neuner (3 Star/10.77 UTR), John Rudden (3 Star/10.12 UTR)
Player(s) to Watch: Harry Shepherd – Blog favorite and crypto connoisseur, Harry Shepherd, had himself an interesting ITA. After losing an incredibly close first round match to Hopkins’ Gu, he got absolutely drubbed by Salisbury’s Colt Williamson, who I knew nothing about before checking out these results. I won’t read too much into these results, but at the same time, he can’t afford any losses like that in the regular season if he wants a chance to return to NCAAs and help his team climb in the rankings.
Schedule Analysis: This season, the Generals have a pretty straightforward schedule, which you can find here. There are plenty of opportunities to compete against the best in the region, but at the end of the day, they still play in the relatively weak ODAC. They begin the season with a match against DI James Madison, which is a nice opportunity early on to see a higher level of competition, but will have no real ramifications for the rest of the season. 20 days and a couple of lower tier matches later, W&L travels to Swarthmore, PA to take on the Garnet. I am very intrigued by this match and will definitely go into more detail about this match in the days prior to it. I won’t call it a “must win”, but it will be very important for both teams for rankings within the region. This will also give us a better indication of where both teams are, since we didn’t get to see much of either of them at ITAs.
Mid March is where we will see what this team is made of, with matches against Hopkins and Mary Washington. Both of these teams on paper are “better” than W&L, however, both of them are incredibly upset prone. This will be a golden opportunity for this young Generals team to make a statement and make a jump in the Atlantic South ranking. After that, they should roll through their conference matches until their trip at the beginning of April down to Atlanta and Chattanooga. W&L will take on Emory, which probably won’t be super competitive, but will give Harry Shepherd a chance to bolster his regional ranking and make a push for NCAAs. The following day, they drive up to Tennessee to take on Sewanee, in what should be another competitive RegASouth match up. They wrap up the season with a few more ODAC matches before a regular season finale against cross-state rivals, Christopher Newport. Washington and Lee is on the rise in my book, while Christopher Newport is slowly becoming a sinking ship. While I do think this match will be slightly competitive, I think the Generals have the clear advantage.
Lineup Analysis:
1 Singles: Harry Shepherd (UTR 11.50) – Looking to build on a very strong sophomore campaign, Shepherd should hold down the fort at the top of the lineup. After going 13-2 at 1st singles last season and qualifying for NCAAs, I am expecting big things moving forward. Shepherd has a big enough game to take down most opponents and he will need to in order for the Generals to have success this season.
2 Singles: Mitchell Thomas (UTR 11.31) – The Generals were strong at the top of the lineup last year with Shepherd and Thomas (10-6 at 2nd singles) and I expect this year to be no different. He had a couple of big wins last year over Swarthmore’s Thibault Vernier and Mary Washington’s Patrick Hughes, but also had a couple of bad losses in conference play. I expect the junior to continue to make steps in the right direction, shake off some of those bad losses and gain a few more tough wins.
3 Singles: Noah Tapp (UTR 10.43) – I went back and forth in my head on this one because from here on out, the lineup is kind of a crapshoot, but going off seniority and fall results, I would slide Tapp in here at the 3rd singles spot. While he did get absolutely decimated by Courtney Murphy, he picked up two gritty, quality wins over Swarthmore’s Evan Han and Mary Washington’s Moses Hutchinson. While he didn’t see much playing time last season, the losses of Zheng and Harmon should slide him into the lineup anywhere from the 3-6 spot.
4 Singles: Bobby Neuner (UTR 10.77) – Based on minimal fall results, it looks as if initially Neuner has the highest ceiling out of the 3 freshmen after pushing Hopkins’ Thygesen to three sets. Like I said earlier, really 3-6 is toss up on this team, but if I had to guess, Bobby will start the highest in
the lineup out of any of the freshmen.
5 Singles: Alex Fedor (UTR 10.64) – Insert freshman #2 here at 5 singles. Fedor’s best win of the fall came over CNU freshman, Ryan Macy, who will most likely be in the top half of the Captain’s lineup. This is a very good sign for the Generals and means that Fedor is more than capable of winning most matches at this position.
6 Singles: John Rudden (UTR 10.12) – Rudden rounds out the lineup at 6 singles, but I am slightly concerned because of his loss to Dickinson freshman Samuel Coan at ITAs. I’m not going to hit the panic button, but I was expecting a little bit more from the 3 star out of New Jersey. That being said, fall results aren’t weighted super heavily for a reason and I expect Rudden to bounce back this spring and have a strong freshman year.
In the Hunt: Tye Loan (UTR 9.22) – Yeah, just in the hunt, not too much else to say. I don’t think he will be starting in many key matches, especially after losses to Salisbury and Virginia Wesleyan at ITAs, but I guess we will see.
Keys to Success:
FRESHMEN! – The Generals are poised to start 3 freshmen this season and they will certainly need them to step up and ball out this year if they are going to be successful. With the top of the lineup pretty much on lock with Shepherd and Thomas, the new guys will need to live up to the hype and clinch some matches for the Generals. The good news is that after getting thrown into the Division I fire to start the season, they will have a couple of confidence building matches before the first DIII match of the season. If 2 out of the 3 freshmen can pick up singles wins in any given match, I give the Generals a 95% chance to win the match.
Doubles – This past year, the Generals lost 3 consistent doubles starters in Kittredge, Harmon and Lukas and will need to fill those gaps. It is also worth noting that Kittredge and Harmon were both sophomores last season. I like the fact that all 3 doubles teams that competed at ITAs were able to secure at least one win, but I won’t look too much into it because it’s the fall. The Generals should be good at singles this season, but against the Garnet, Jays, Eagles, other Eagles, Tigers and Captains, they will need more than that.
Realistic Best Case Scenario: The Generals are able to win most of the key in region matchups in route to winning the ODAC and securing and NCAA tournament berth.
Realistic Worst Case Scenario: The youth of this team gets the best of them this season and they are unable to secure any signature wins, but they still win the ODAC.
Prediction: Unfortunately I’m going to have to shy towards the latter and predict that the Generals go 14-5 this season with wins over Swarthmore and CNU and losses to James Madison, Hopkins, Mary Washington, Emory and Sewanee. They will win the ODAC and depending on the draw, win a round at NCAAs before bowing out to most likely Emory. I think this team is still a year out from beating teams like Swarthmore, Sewanee and Mary Washington. Don’t underestimate Washington and Lee though, they 100% have upset capability.
You know the drill, if you would like to provide insight or ask any questions, leave a comment, shoot me and email or even @ me on Twitter. Until next time, Reg ASouth out!
To the extent any reliance is placed on the UTR rankings, conclusions have to be questioned since those rankings have not been adjusted for Fall results.
This was a great and in-depth article! I think your prediction is spot on with these generals and they look to be a team on the rise. I hope you keep up these insightful previews because the Mid Atlantic looks to be a very fun region this season! Can’t wait for the next preview!