Welcome, boys and girls, to the article that REALLY begins my blogging season. The Midd Invite recap is fine, but it’s just that, a recap. Everybody else is writing these generic preview and kickoff articles, but I’m here to bring you a stuffed ITA preview, full of mediocre writing, uneducated rantings, and what you all love most…dumb predictions! I have written this preview for each of the past six years now, and this field seems about as open as any during that stretch. There are certainly some studs at the top of the draw, but as always this remains BY FAR the deepest tournament in the country, and to quote our Headmaster, “IT’S NOT EVEN CLOSE”. The New England ITA has six of the top-10 schools in the country accounting for more than half the spots in this magnificent 64-person draw, and that doesn’t even get into other top-25 schools like Tufts and MIT. This will be an absolute grind of a weekend, with a lot of the top talent being seeded in both singles and doubles, we should have some tired legs come Sunday. Personally, I think this is the best DIII tennis weekend of the fall season, so let’s get to it and take a deeper look at this year’s field.
THE FAVORITES
#1 Sean Wei (Amherst) & #2 Boris Sorkin (Colby): There is a reason that these two guys are the top two seeds. If Sorkin hadn’t have lost first round at the Midd Invite, he very likely would have been the No. 1 overall seed attempting to defend his crown. Both guys have made DEEP runs here before, with Wei beating Rosen (Bates) and Taylor (Williams) at his first ITA before losing in 3 sets to Fink (Wes), and following it up as the No. 2 overall seed and making it to the semis before losing to Boris in 3 sets. In addition to his title last year, Boris also won a couple rounds as a freshman, beating a little guy named Grant Urken in the 2nd round before losing to the eventual champ in Brian Grodecki (Williams). Both guys have performed well at this tournament. Both guys followed up strong freshmen campaigns with excellent sophomore years. Both guys decided to stay and not go abroad during their junior falls. Both guys could provide some fireworks if we get a No. 1 vs No. 2 in the finals! You can’t go wrong picking either of these guys, and it’s their winning experiences at this tournament that keep them a tier above the rest…
THE SEEDED CONTENDERS
#3 David Aizenberg (Brandeis), #4 Scott Altmeyer (Colby), #5 Peter Anker (Wesleyan), #7 Arturo Kam (Williams): At some point, I have to leave some seeds off the list, otherwise I might as well just blurb a little bit about each guy. These guys, to me, are the tier 2 title contenders. I’m not saying each guy is even going to make it out of Day 1, I’m just saying that if these guys continue to show what we’ve seen from a combination of last season, previous summer work, and what we’ve seen from some this fall, I could see any of these four guys lifting a trophy on Sunday. You’ll see below I’ve picked one of these four guys to make the finals, and one to not even make the quarters, because TRYING TO PREDICT THIS TOURNAMENT IS A GOD-FORSAKEN CRAPSHOOT. Aizy and Altmeyer have shown they’re ready to pick up right where last year left off with strong starts at the Midd Invite. Anker turned his game up a notch at the end of last year, and I’m excited to get our first match look at him kicking off his sophomore campaign. Kam was a #6 his freshman year (a really good #6, but still), had a tennis-filled summer, won a summer ITA, and came back a #1/2 player for a top-10 team, very similar to what Grant Urken did after his freshman year at Bowdoin. If Kam put in the same amount of work this summer, I’m stoked to see what he can do this year.
LOWER SEEDS WHO COULD WIN IT ALL
#9-16 Ananth Raghavan (Williams), #9-16 Kevin Ma (Amherst), #9-16 Noah Lilienthal, #9-16 Isaac Gorelik (Tufts): This round isn’t really built off draw or even past results at this tournament. This is based off who can get hot and do some damage. Young Nanth is no longer young, and is appearing in his final ITA. Ma’s double two-hander of destiny let him down some last year, but we’ve also seen him beat some of the best players in the country. Lilienthal was one of if not the most clutch freshmen in the country last year. His doubles partner isn’t around for this one, but I’d expect the diminutive sophomore to be as loud as ever, and likely rocking one of his trademark sleeveless shirts out there. Gorelik’s caption speaks for itself. My guy hasn’t lost yet this year, and has wins over Williamson (projected Skid #2), Coramutla (projected Deis #2-3), Altmeyer (projected Colby #1 – via walkover) and Morris (projected Midd #1-3) at Midd earlier this fall. We know all these guys can get hot, but in a tournament like this it takes more than getting hot for a four-game stretch, it takes sustained fire and all four of these guys can bring it. Adam Tzeng should probably also belong in this section, but his draw is just so tough (Lee/Xiao in Round 2, Wei in Round 3, Kam in QFs, etc. that I’m leaving him out.
FRESHMEN TO WATCH
#9-16 Rishabh Sharda (Tufts), #9-16 Robbie Ward (Middlebury), Aidan Harris (Midd), Tristan Bradley (Bowdoin), Marek Michulka (Amherst), Banks Evans (USCGA): Where to begin here? There is almost always a freshman who makes an impact at this tournament. That’s not surprising, it’s because about 1/2 of the best teams in the country are playing here and they tend to have good recruiting classes. Last year Frelinghuysen and Tzeng both made the semis of the doubles, Yang/Morris/Anker all made the Sweet 16. In the fall of 2017, Austin Barr made the semis and Fink made the finals. Three years ago, Marchalik made the semis and Cuba (who was in his first year of DIII) won the whole thing. I could go on and on (have you ever read one of my articles?) and this year should be no exception as it boasts another talented freshman class. Rish won the B-Flight at Midd, so much like his headbanded teammate he is undefeated. The player he beat, in a superbreaker in the finals was another freshman, and one of Middlebury’s two young studs. Ward also earned a #9-16 seed, and has a bit of an easier draw so we might be talking about him on Saturday/Sunday. Harris was Midd’s best recruit, and was even playing in the A-Flight over Ward and established guys like Xiao, but he fell in the first round to Coramutla. First match, done. Perhaps now we’ll see a bit more of that talent and set up a fun all-freshman 2nd round matchup between him and Rish.
Two guys we haven’t actually seen play in tournaments yet are Tristan Bradley and Marek Michulka, the top recruits for Bowdoin and Amherst. Michulka played behind the usual suspects for Amherst, slotting in at #6 against Hobart and winning with ease. My guess is there’s not too much of a difference between Michulka and the talented sophomores who play above him in the lineup, and it would not be surprising to see Marek move up some in the lineup come springtime. We actually haven’t seen a thing from Bradley yet, so who knows what we’re going to get from the 4-star, but he has a heck of a first match against not so Lil’ Raghavan so we’ll see how he handles that situation and reserve judgement until we see him play at The Wallach and Wesleyan Invite later this fall. Finally, some love for a non-NESCAC/top-10 school (who knew it was possible?) Banks Evans may sound like his names should be reversed, but he is definitely a freshman to keep an eye on this weekend. Likely Coast Guard’s top player this year, Evans has a potentially tricky matchup with the crafty Zach Lieb (Wes) in the first round before a hypothetical matchup with Arturo Kam. Tough road, but Banksy looked really good in USCGA’s opening tournaments so here’s hoping the Bears have a legit contender on our hands for the next few years. Also, why does Coast Guard use the Bear as its mascot? That makes no sense and is so generic. I propose an Amherst-style mascot competition where we decide how I shall refer to USCGA’s players in the ITA preview/recap each year…
UNSEEDED GUYS WHO COULD MAKE A RUN
Harris Foulkes (Amherst), Jeff Chen (Brandeis), Evan Fortier (Bowdoin), Calvin Chung (Williams)/Nikhil Das (Brandeis): I’m trying not to double up here, because there are a couple freshmen mentioned in the section above who also belong in this section, but all of these five guys have something in common. All were very successful middle of the lineup guys on top-10 teams last year, all have a full year of experience, and all of these guys got better from the start of last fall to the end of last spring, signaling their ceiling is still ahead of them. I debated between Foulkes and Turchetta in this category for a while, but even though Harris has to deal with Boris in the 1st round, the rest of his region is honestly easier than Turchetta who is in the Pod of Death. Both of those guys will be tough outs no matter when they play, but if they can survive Friday, they could be primed to go deep. Plus, all Foulkes needs to do is win one match (who cares that it’s against the defending champion) to make this pick successful. PLAY THE ODDS, PEOPLE! I have Chen in this category because of his draw. He likely has the easiest path to the Sweet-16 of any unseeded player in the entire draw, and then could get an emotionally drained Scotty Alt early on Saturday morning after a night at home. Fortier is probably the best example in this category because to me the sophomore is a total wild card. He is very streaky, and hits a HUGE ball when he gets going. That is the type of unseeded player nobody should want to play early in a grueling tournament. In addition, he is also in one of the easier regions of the draw and should get the winner of a long match between Ruparel (Herst) and Morris (Midd). Finally, the winner of the Chung/Das match. Honestly, I had pegged Calvin Chung as a dark horse to make it to Sunday before the draw came out, but for him to accomplish that now means surviving the Pod of Death. As I will elaborate on below, both Chung and Das have the game to play long into the weekend, but only one of them will get that chance.
BEST 1ST ROUND MATCHUPS
Calvin Chung (Williams) vs Nikhil Das (Brandeis): A unseeded doozy to start us off. I talked about this a little bit in the unseeded section above, but both of these guys had great sophomore years and are looking to build on what was some unexpected (to us, probably not to them) success in the middle of their respective lineups. Along with Guo, Chung was one of the more pleasant NESCAC surprises last year, going from a bench player to a successful guy in the middle of the singles lineup. Das has two years of lineup experience now, and this is very realistically a matchup we could see if these two teams ever played a dual match (would have to be at NCAAs this year). Unluckily for both, the road only gets tougher in the Group of Death as the winner will matchup against either of the next two guys below…
Princeton Carter (Wesleyan) vs #8 Oscar Yang (Bowdoin): Get me a front row seat and some popcorn, please and thank you. We’ve been touting Prince’s heart for what feels like the better part of a decade now, but the senior is officially playing in his final ITA this weekend. Tough draw as he gets a seed and Bowdoin’s presumptive #1 after the departure of Urken and Jiang. Although Oscar’s colorful hair was pretty awesome last year, he was not known for being super loud and demonstrative on the court. Quite the opposite with Prince, even though he’s not technically playing for his teammates this weekend. It’s a tough matchup for both players, and it wont get any easier for the winner as I mentioned above the winner get either Chung or Das. Best of luck, boys.
Harris Foulkes (Amherst) vs #2 Boris Sorkin (Tufts): Rough start for our defending champ. Foulkes was rock solid at the bottom of the Amherst lineup last year, and along with Ruparel and Turchetta comprise one of the best sophomore classes in the country. He will be a tough first round matchup for Boris, and while the Russian Rocket will be favored, he did fall in the first round at Midd earlier this fall, so there will likely be a few pre-match jitters. Foulkes is the type of player who will make you earn your win, which is not the guy you want on the other side of the net if you’re even the slightest bit nervous.
Alex Taylor (Williams) vs #5 Peter Anker (Wesleyan): Fun matchup here. Taylor is now the wily vet, while Anker is the younger player, but both can hit the smack out of the ball and both guys are silky with their volleys. Expect some powerful baseline rallies, but also a lot of net play here. It’s very possible whichever guy is hitting his serve better will come away with this match, and unless one guy is treeing hard I’d expect this one to go three sets.
#7 Arturo Kam (Williams) vs Adam Guo (Middlebury): I was big on Kam last year at this time and it paid off, so there’s no reason for me to change my tune now. I wish he had a slightly easier first round matchup if I were going to pick him to make a deep run (see more below), because Adam Guo should have gotten more votes in last year’s most improved player category, going from a Midd bench player to a rock-solid middle of lineup guy. If he has taken another leap, not only will this be a tough match but Guo could make a much deeper run in this tournament.
TOUGHEST REGION OF THE BRACKET
Tufts #2 (who just won the Midd A-Flight), Amherst’s #3/4, Trinity’s #1/2, Bates’ #1/2/3, Williams’ #3/4, Brandeis’ #4, Wesleyan’s #5 (senior captain/heart and soul of the team), and Bowdoin’s #1. BRUTAL. Would you really be SHOCKED if any one of those 8 guys came out of this pod? Ok, I’d be pretty shocked if Bilicic or Kupferman did, but those are still top players for NESCAC schools! There is no other pod in the draw without at least two players from non-traditional power schools. Now, that doesn’t mean that the top players from the likes of Gordon/Nichols/lower down NEWMAC aren’t good, because they have won multiple matches here before (and recently!), but if I’m looking for a slightly easier path through the tournament, that tends to be the place to start.
WHO GOT A GOOD DRAW?
Trick question, in this ITA there is no such thing as a really good draw. The depth is too good. That said, here are a few players I think will have easier early matches than most others: #1 Sean Wei (Amherst), #3 David Aizenberg (Brandeis), #4 Scott Altmeyer (Colby), Jeff Chen (Brandeis), Evan Fortier (Bowdoin). Having a slightly easier first day could be HUGE for Wei, as we know he’s something of a streaky player and you never know exactly how he’s going to start a tournament. But, once he gets used to the courts and shakes off a little rust, I like his chances if he makes it to Saturday. Aizy and Scotty don’t have SUPER easy draws, they just have a lot of inexperienced players in their respective pods, especially their #9-16 seeds. As I mentioned earlier, Chen and Fortier not only have 1st round matches where they’ll be favored as unseeded players, but they also have a winnable hypothetical 2nd round matchup against somebody who will have been tested in their 1st round. The importance of getting somebody with tired legs later in the day cannot be understated, especially when a lot of guys haven’t been pushing their fitness over the summer.
5 QUICK THOUGHTS ON THE DOUBLES
- The seeds are really good! Just like in the singles, there is a reason that these teams are seeded. With the exception of Wang/Fortier, all of the top-8 seeds have had good doubles success at some point in their careers, even if only recent. While we know doubles and its pro-set to be a fickle temptress AND Friday’s no-ad scoring will add even more instability, I still am finding it difficult to pick against most of the seeds moving forward in this bracket.
- Experience could come into play. Look at the top seeds, they played together will great results all of last year. Lilienthal and Carter both have plenty of doubles success, just not necessarily together last spring, same goes for Wei/Foulkes. While the team of Fortier and Wang struggled at times last year, they now also have as much experience playing together as almost any other team in this draw. Even the Colby and Tufts duos seeded in the #5-8 range are coming off very solid weekends at Middlebury recently, allowing the beginning of what could be some special team chemistry.
- Jerry Jiang’s run last year was abnormal, but look for at least one guy to be around late in both draws. JERRY-JERRY-JERRY played so much tennis a year ago this weekend, and his run to the finals of both draws was crazy, but it’s also not THAT abnormal to see a player still alive in both draws on Sunday. Six of the top eight doubles seeds have at least one player who is also a top eight singles seed. While that should mean this is a top-heavy tournament, there is plenty of parity as most of those seeds are around the same level. It’s going to be a fun weekend!
- Is there a real chance of an all-Deis finals? At points last year Tzeng and Chen looked like the best doubles team in the entire country, yet they were the #2 team at Brandeis. It’s an accomplishment that both top Deis duos are seeded this year, but it’s also well earned. They are on opposite sides of the draw, so it’s not impossible, however it is still unlikely.
- Might we see a deep run by a home team? Altmeyer and Wenger made the semis of the A-Flight at Middlebury this fall, and in doing so earned a top-8 seed this weekend. We’ve seen deep runs in front of home crowds before, and this team absolutely has the firepower to do it. Colby has not hosted ITAs during the time I’ve been involved in DIII tennis, so I would hope that they might actually get a pretty big turn out, kind of like Bates did when they hosted NCAAs in the 2000’s. It would be really fun to see either of these guys make a run in singles, but doubles plays to the crowd. Short points, fiery reactions, and players feeding off not only the emotion of the crowd, but each other as well. While I’m not picking the Mule duo to win the tournament, I will absolutely be rooting for it.
PREDICTIONS!!!
This is a dumb section given how little tennis we’ve seen since last May. That said, what would be the point of a tournament preview without something for you all to make fun of afterwards? For the record, I had Sorkin winning it all last year, but the odds of getting back-to-back ITA picks right are about the same as winning back-to-back titles…
SINGLES QUARTERFINALISTS: Sean Wei (Amherst), Isaac Gorelik (Tufts), Alex Taylor (Williams), David Aizenberg (Brandeis), Scott Altmeyer (Colby), Noah Lilienthal (Wesleyan), Arturo Kam (Williams), Boris Sorkin (Tufts).
SINGLES SEMIFINALISTS: Sean Wei, David Aizenberg, Noah Lilienthal, Arturo Kam
SINGLES FINAL: Sean Wei def Arturo Kam
DOUBLES SEMIFINALISTS: Taylor/Frelinghuysen (Williams), Tzeng/Chen (Brandeis), Altmeyer/Wenger (Colby) & Aizenberg/Coramutla (Brandeis)
DOUBLES FINAL: Taylor/Frelinghuysen def. Aizenberg/Coramutla
ITA Recap?
Can’t wait!