Since D3CentralW is busy with life things I’m going to take a crack at previewing the UW-Whitewater regional, which takes place starting this Friday in Whitewater, Wisconsin. I’m going to address the elephant in the room up front here – as far as the regionals go, this is objectively the weakest. We said in our Bracket Reaction article that we thought Emory had the easiest road to the championship with #23 W&L as their #2 seed in regionals among other things, but in terms of making the Elite 8, I think it’s pretty obvious that Chicago hit the geography jackpot. No hate on Chicago, and I understand that there needed to be 2 regionals in Central states to accommodate the number of Central teams in the tournament. However, let’s not fool ourselves into thinking that this region is balanced with the other ones. #27 Carleton as the 2 seed is slightly absurd. Now that we got that out of the way, let’s move on to nicer topics. The schools competing in Whitewater this weekend are: #12 Chicago, #27 Carleton, #36 UW-Whitewater, Lake Forest, Luther, Edgewood, and St. Scholastica.
CHICAGO
ITA Rank: #12
How they got here: Chicago finished 2nd at UAAs and made it into the tournament via Pool C. Big wins for them this season include MIT, Denison (x2), Kenyon, Case Western, Wash U (x2), and Brandeis. In the finals of UAAs, the Maroons surprised everyone by pushing #1 Emory to 4-4 before losing in the third set of the final match.
Why they can win: This is a really solid Top 6-12 team who was blessed with a region where the next best team is outside the Top 25. Though they lost their recent match with Emory, they have to be pretty confident in their ability to compete with any team in the country right now. The bottom of their singles lineup is really coming into form. They’ve picked a good time to peak.
How they can be beaten: This weekend I would put them in the unbeatable category. Next week that changes but let’s take this one day at a time.
Player to watch: Nicole Semenov. OK, this girl has put together one of the best possible seasons. She’s been chilling at #5 singles and #3 doubles and has lost only 1 D3 singles match to Caroline Cox from CMS, who she beat at Indoors a few weeks prior to that loss. Not only has she been winning, but she beat up on Emory’s Cartledge 6-0, 6-1 and most of her other matches have gone similarly. We’re going to see very big things from this Freshman, be it this week, next week, or over the next 3 years. You heard it here first. Actually, maybe not, I didn’t know much about Central players until like 5 minutes ago, but the point is Nicole can play and you should watch her.
Odds of making the NCAA Quarterfinals: 98%
CARLETON
ITA Rank: #27
How they got here: By winning the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC). Their most recent trip to the NCAA tournament was in 2014 and this will be their 7th trip to the NCAA tournament as a team. Their biggest wins this season include UW-Whitewater (x2), Bethel, and GAC, with their only D3 loss coming against Depauw.
Why they can win: They’ve notched some really solid wins against UW-Whitewater and that gives me confidence going into the Round of 32 that will mark their third meeting with UW-Whitewater this season. If they make it to the Round of 16 they should be content with their season. Against Chicago it’s hard to find reasons they can win.
How they can be beaten: Just looking at their statistics, #2 doubles and #5 singles are relative weak spots for Carleton. While Chicago probably doesn’t really care, UW-Whitewater needs both of these matches to go their way to convert the earlier season losses to the post season win. In the previous meetings that Carleton won 7-2 and 6-3, 1 dubs, 2 dubs, 1 singles, 2 singles, and 5 singles all flipped winners. Did that make sense? If Carleton won 1 dubs the first time, then UWW won 1 dubs the second time. And so on. Anyways, this tells me that these are all competitive matches and if UWW gets all 5 then that’s a loss.
Player to watch: Sonya Romanenko. She plays #1 singles and #3 doubles for Carleton and notched a win over NCAA tournament qualifier Gabi Kitchell from UWW earlier this season. Their rematch will be a good one. She’s an impressive 19-3 on the season so she’s in fighting form and ready to show us some good tennis.
Odds of making the NCAA Quarterfinals: 1%
UW-WHITEWATER
ITA Rank: #36
How they got here: They won the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) for the 12th consecutive year. Their biggest wins this season were TCNJ and Depauw.
Why they can win: They have a strong leader in Gabi Kitchell and will be have the home court advantage. Let’s not even talk about Chicago here. UW-Whitewater should consider this weekend a success if they get by Carleton, and that’s already a pretty tall order. It’s hard to argue with two previous losses this season but if they can nab all five of those swing matches I mentioned above under Carleton then they have a shot.
How they can be beaten: Where they’re pretty strong at the top of the lineup, their middle and bottom of the lineup has a hard time holding their own against ranked teams. This lack of depth will be their downfall this weekend.
Player to watch: Gabi Kitchell and Julie Martin. Two seniors who play #1 dubs together and #1 and #2 singles, respectively. And they were both nice enough to fill out my senior questionnaire. Thanks for that. They’ve been a strength for their team all season and will unfortunately have to shoulder most of the pressure this weekend if they want to take out Carleton. Kitchell has the NCAA individual tournament to look forward to so she’ll be trying to stay sharp for that.
Odds of making the NCAA Quarterfinals: 1%
LAKE FOREST/LUTHER/EDGEWOOD/ST. SCHOLASTICA
How they got here: Lake Forest is 21-3 on the season and won the Midwest Conference (MWC) to qualify for NCAAs for the FIRST time in program history. Congrats to them. Luther is 15-9 and won the American Rivers Conference for the first time since 2011. Edgewood is 20-7 and won the Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference (NACC) tournament to make NCAAs for the first time since 2015. St. Scholastica is 17-6 and won the Upper Midwest Athletic Conference (UMAC) for the 5th consecutive year.
Why they can win: These schools are just a tier below Chicago, Carleton, and UWW, but Lake Forest has a first round matchup with Luther that could get interesting. That match will come down to depth. I’ll tell you my pick below. Other than that it’s hard to come up with ways for these teams to come up with wins against the other D3 juggernauts in the draw.
How they can be beaten: By playing against a team that wins all the matches.
Player(s) to watch: Allison Watts (Lake Forest), Britta Pressler (Luther), Haley Brooks (Edgewood), Jaclyn Swift (Edgewood), Marissa Wilson (Edgewood), Elise Hauer (St. Scholastica), Taylor Hays (St. Scholastica), Katelyn Rice (St. Scholastica). All seniors ending their careers with an NCAA appearance; that’s pretty cool.
Odds of making the NCAA Quarterfinals: <0.1%
How the weekend is going to play out:
Friday- UWW will play their first round against St. Scholastica. UWW has been here before and won’t mess around, they’ll get this one 5-0. Carleton will play their first around against Edgewood, and like UWW they will want to take care of business. I predict a 5-0 win. Lake Forest vs. Luther has the potential to be the most interesting matchup of the day but based on results against common opponents (Wheaton, Grinnell) from this season I think Lake Forest will take this one 5-1 or 5-2.
Saturday- Chicago plays their first match against the winner of Lake Forest/Luther. This will be a solid warm up for the Maroons but I expect it to be 5-0 in Chicago’s favor. The interesting matchup of Saturday will be UWW against Carleton. I talked about this above but given 5-6 matches will be really competitive and the other 3 will be comfortably won by Carleton, it’s a fairly safe bet to say Carleton will win this won. I think the score will be 5-3 or 5-4. UWW will really want it, especially since they’re at home.
Sunday- Chicago will play the winner of Carleton/UWW. They’ll win 5-0 to advance to the Elite 8.
And with that I have completed my season previews. With 9 hours to spare. I hope everyone is ready for a weekend of great tennis!
ASW