TLDR: Give us feedback in the comments so we can continue to improve and if you’re interested in joining the women’s blog team shoot us an email!
Last week the team DIII tennis season wrapped up on the women’s side with an epic victory by the one and only Wesleyan Cardinals. That underdog win was the icing on the cake to a year filled with countless upsets, close matches, and surprising results that left fans and us bloggers on our toes and enthralled by DIII tennis. Now that the season has (sadly) come to an end, we present to you a wrap-up article featuring some miscellaneous thoughts and hot takes from your five favorite women’s DIII tennis bloggers, along with a request for feedback and a call for more women’s writers so that we can up our game even more because we may or may not be slightly competitive with the men’s side of the blog. Okay, let’s begin with some stream of consciousness and a peek inside the minds of us bloggers.
What thoughts are running through blogger minds right now?!?
Analyst: It makes me really happy to see a new NCAA champ.
Okay, I had picked CMS as the winner in my bracket challenge but even so, it was awesome to see Wesleyan, a team that had never made it past the Elite Eight, win the title. We are no longer in the midst of an era of Williams/Emory domination and I love that about DIII tennis right now. Wesleyan played their heart out in Kalamazoo this year and it’s evident that all their players put in a ton of work to reach here, and it’s incredible to see how this program has risen so quickly (both the women’s and men’s sides) in just the past few years.
ASW: I’m also happy to see 3 different schools represented as the singles, doubles, and team champions.
Huge congratulations to Wesleyan, Emory, and CMS for all bringing home a national championship! It’s nice to see that the competition in D3 is stiffer than ever, and there are players from so many different schools that have the talent to win it all.
West: NCAAs was a great week for sportsmanship.
I lost too many tennis matches to count during my playing days so call me old-fashioned but I super enjoyed the sportsmanship on display at NCAAs this year. A million dollars isn’t cool. You know what’s cool? Respect for your teammates and fellow competitors. We all live for that moment when you rush the court after winning a national championship, and Wes had a great rush. Rewatching it I noticed CMS rushed the court for their player as well.
up at 6:30AM on the other side of the world, crying and shaking. i’m speechless. IM SO INCREDIBLY PROUD @CardsTennis pic.twitter.com/SPPjRVPaya
— Eudice Chong (@whodis_eudice) May 22, 2019
This was so warm and comforting, not just because Wes won their first national title and all of the emotions that come with it, but also because CMS made sure that Lee didn’t have to face that moment alone and said “hey, we’re here for you.” That gave me the fuzzies inside. Then we got more great moments when everyone on Wes and CMS did handshake lines with the opposing team while getting their trophies. While I’m sure that was awkward for all involved, it made me happier than a pup with two tails to see that level of respect shown by each squad, and the fact that it happened I think really highlights how different D3 is from other types of competition.
NEW: It’s super exciting to think that a lot of the players we saw across the whole NCAA tournament will be with us again next year.
We’ve got a lot more coming on this one as the season wraps up, but I think it’s super cool to know that a lot of these starting lineups for next year won’t be changing or will be minimally affected by graduation. As Central pointed out, where are all the seniors? I don’t know if there’s some vortex that has snatched them all up, but I do think it’ll be interesting to see going forward whether we can accept this year’s outcome as the new status quo or if these young guns will continue to battle amongst themselves for the next 2-4 years to find out who reigns supreme.
West: Kalamazoo was a great host this week.
I have to give a shoutout to the Hornets staff, Colette Lewis, and the whole team for a very well run championships. I don’t know how but they churned out content and updates way faster than we could ever hope to. They also had to deal with a ton of rain over the course of the week, and were somehow still able to play most of the tennis outdoors (where I watched way too much of the live stream) and keep live stats up for all of those tuning in around the country.
ASW: I really hope we get some fresh writers.
I am so incredibly proud of our team for all we have accomplished this year. We probably quadrupled our women’s content – we did our first ever podcast, started POTW and power rankings, had our first ever bracket challenge, and came up with new series and article ideas. We’re not done though and we need more writers to keep up our trajectory (especially Central writers)!! When The Analyst joined us, we were able (and excited) to talk about what interested her and let her run wild with her great ideas, resulting in one of the coolest articles I’ve ever seen on the Blog. If we get more writers I’ll finally be able to pursue my passion and become D3FoodW.
NEW: I’m really sad the season is over.
Obviously, this goes without saying. We all clearly love D3 tennis because who else would take time out of their lives to follow and crank out articles about the state of D3 tennis, our wild predictions, etc.? Anyways, we all know my favorite part of the year is NCAAs, and it’s such a hard comedown from the best time of year to the end, but fret not, readers! The women’s blogging team is bringing you content for at least the next two weeks and we’re really hoping to keep the momentum going and get some stuff out over the summer, so keep your eyes on the Blog!
ASW: We’re going to miss D3CentralW a lot but make sure to keep up with her on twitter! Her new handle is @D3WTweeter.
https://twitter.com/D3WTweeter/status/1133556881287458817
I think it’s worth saying again that D3CentralW, formerly D3NEW, now D3WTweeter, is a gem of a human being who has given so much to the Blog over the years, including being the one thread of consistency on the women’s side. Truly, we would not be where we are today without all of the groundwork she has done. I will certainly miss hiding behind her during internet arguments that occasionally happen when the D3 tennis scene gets controversial. I will also miss her constant state of zen during said arguments when I’m ready to go nuclear.
Analyst: When is Wesleyan vs. Blog Team happening?!?
Wesleyan vs. CMS was good but we all know that Wesleyan vs. Blog Team is the real title match. We have our lineup all set, none of us are rusty at all, and we all totally have eligibility left. We just need Coach Fried to get us on the schedule.
ASW: Analyst and I practiced that one time, we’re ready to throw down.
Coach Joanne Marshall is working on our schedule. Let’s just say our strength of schedule will be top notch considering we’re only playing one match but it’s against the national champion.
NEW: But when is the second blogger brunch happening?
I’m not really one for FOMO, but I definitely had it for maybe the first time in my life when Analyst, West and ASW got brunch earlier in the spring. I’m feeling left out, so I’m demanding a second one – maybe a boozy brunch followed by a Blog Team vs. Wesleyan showdown?
We want feedback!
We feel that this has been a big year for the women’s side of the blog, and hope we’ve provided coverage to all you fans, coaches, players, and parents who follow along and read our walls of text. But we want to be even better! But we need your feedback to do so. So pretty please comment on this article to let us know:
- What you liked
- What we could do better
- Suggestions for articles
- Feedback on our Twitter presence
- Anything else!
We want more writers!
We’re aiming to be the best DIII women’s tennis blog out there (okay, it’s possible that we’re the only one). But doing so depends on there being bloggers so that we can write and tweet and have a group chat with our very own inside jokes. So if you want to join (or think you maybe want to join) us, please shoot an email to any/all of d3asouthwomens@gmail.com, d3newomens@gmail.com, d3westw@gmail.com, and d3womensanalyst@gmail.com. I’m the newest addition to the team because I made a spontaneous decision a couple months ago to reach out when I read a Power Rankings article and thought Whoa that’s cool the women’s blog is doing power rankings. I think I maybe want in on this blogging thing. And I am so glad I did! I promise we’re all very friendly and not scary. We’d love to have some new members of the women’s team, and it’s not a huge time commitment, we’re totally open and flexible with what anyone can contribute.
Thank you to all the followers of the blog for reading our articles and following our tweets throughout this season! We’ll be coming at you with some content over the next week or so, and then will mostly (but not entirely) be taking a break until the fall because bloggers need summer vacays too. With that, I declare my wrap-up article wrapped up.