• The KillerFrogs

TCU Men's Tennis - 2020-2021

Jared7

Active Member
Nick Chappell and Reese Stalder won the doubles title this morning at Prostejov 3-6, 7-6 (7-3), 10-8 in a close match over Gengel/Ignatik. This is excellent news for both players! But Rybakov lost in the semis in singles 3 and 2 to Sanchez Izquierdo, so no title for Rybo.
 

Jared7

Active Member
Rybakov and Chappell have stayed in Czechia for the Prague Challenger. Rybo won his first round qualie match this morning over Marek Gengel 7-5, 6-1 and will now face the #2 qualie seed Nick Hardt tomorrow. Chappell is already into the main draw and will open his Round of 32 match against Kaichi Ushida tomorrow as well.
 

Jared7

Active Member
Rybakov beat Hardt this morning at Prague 7-6 (7-3), 6-3 to advance to the main draw. But Chappell lost his opening rounder to Ushida 4-6, 6-3, 1-6.

It doesn't look like Norrie will be at Winston-Salem and his next tourney will be the U.S. Open.
 

Jared7

Active Member
I'm sure that everyone, like me, is currently on tenterhooks eagerly anticipating Roditi's release of the 2021-22 schedule which should be coming any day now (although last year, because of COVID, he waited until mid-September). That'll, of course, be the trigger for a new 2021-22 thread and we can put this one to bed. Joggin has already jumped the gun on the Golf thread and is running up a huge lead in posts, likes and reads and Roditi is just, like, sitting there, and refuses to take minor sports Kf.c thread competitions seriously.

A&M has already released their new schedule, and, while it includes Tech, it doesn't include TCU as yet despite the fact that we've played them annually for over a decade now. Now, of course, in tennis scheduling, that doesn't mean beans because matches can always be scheduled at any time and maybe the Aggies didn't include us (as yet) because we haven't finalized our schedule yet. But it might also be because Coach Denton is afraid of us - they've had substantial losses (Rinderknech, Habib, Aguilar) in players and we're returning everyone off a quarter-finalist and we've got 2 new graduate transfers (Aguilar; Ruehl) that have clearly added depth to the team. And as long noted, the ITA Kickoff draft in June clearly showed that the entire tennis world is expecting TCU to be a NCAA contender and wanted to avoid us like the plague.

If Donati cared at all about tennis, he'd be pressuring Roditi to finalize the schedule soon!
 

Purp

Active Member
I'm sure that everyone, like me, is currently on tenterhooks eagerly anticipating Roditi's release of the 2021-22 schedule which should be coming any day now (although last year, because of COVID, he waited until mid-September). That'll, of course, be the trigger for a new 2021-22 thread and we can put this one to bed. Joggin has already jumped the gun on the Golf thread and is running up a huge lead in posts, likes and reads and Roditi is just, like, sitting there, and refuses to take minor sports Kf.c thread competitions seriously.

A&M has already released their new schedule, and, while it includes Tech, it doesn't include TCU as yet despite the fact that we've played them annually for over a decade now. Now, of course, in tennis scheduling, that doesn't mean beans because matches can always be scheduled at any time and maybe the Aggies didn't include us (as yet) because we haven't finalized our schedule yet. But it might also be because Coach Denton is afraid of us - they've had substantial losses (Rinderknech, Habib, Aguilar) in players and we're returning everyone off a quarter-finalist and we've got 2 new graduate transfers (Aguilar; Ruehl) that have clearly added depth to the team. And as long noted, the ITA Kickoff draft in June clearly showed that the entire tennis world is expecting TCU to be a NCAA contender and wanted to avoid us like the plague.

If Donati cared at all about tennis, he'd be pressuring Roditi to finalize the schedule soon!
Like whoring... I bit.
 

Jared7

Active Member
Probably our best US recruit since Rybakov...


Well, I guess Roditi's been up to something and recruiting a highly-ranked junior is a good way to shut me up. Gorzny's most recent juniors activity includes semi-final appearances at Plantation, Coral Gables and quarters at Delray Beach and San Diego this Spring. And just this past week, he was a doubles finalist at the USTA National Championships at Kalamazoo. But the biggest news about him is that, prior to Kalamazoo in 2019, he suddenly was struck with a debilitating brain infection from which he has, apparently, now recovered. So much so that most of his top performances have occurred since then. We'll be needing help in 2022 because we could lose some players then.
 
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Jared7

Active Member
Alex Rybakov beat Johannes Haerteis 4 and 2 this morning in the Round of 32 at the Prague Challenger and he's advanced to the Round of 16 where he will play 5th seeded Michael Geerts, a Belgian who is ranked #297 (Rybo is #411). This is as deep as Alex has ever gone in a Challenger.
 

Jared7

Active Member
Rybakov just lost 2 and 2 to Geerts in Prague. Making the Round of 16 in a Challenger, though, is just as good as making the semis in a Futures.
 

jake102

Active Member
Rybakov just lost 2 and 2 to Geerts in Prague. Making the Round of 16 in a Challenger, though, is just as good as making the semis in a Futures.

Not a terrible result, but obviously plenty of improvement needed.

Got him at a career high of 396 now! Finally breaking that 400 barrier.
 

JogginFrog

Active Member
I'm sure that everyone, like me, is currently on tenterhooks eagerly anticipating Roditi's release of the 2021-22 schedule which should be coming any day now (although last year, because of COVID, he waited until mid-September). That'll, of course, be the trigger for a new 2021-22 thread and we can put this one to bed. Joggin has already jumped the gun on the Golf thread and is running up a huge lead in posts, likes and reads and Roditi is just, like, sitting there, and refuses to take minor sports Kf.c thread competitions seriously.
...
If Donati cared at all about tennis, he'd be pressuring Roditi to finalize the schedule soon!

LOL -- I was blissfully unaware of the official transition point for a new season thread. As I posted yesterday, TCU women's golf has posted its roster but not its schedule. (In contrast to A&M, which released its schedule on August 2 but has yet to post its roster, which is expected to include a TCU transfer. I digress.)

I would say posting of either roster or schedule would be sufficient grounds...but looks like neither tennis team has done so.

Nevertheless, be not troubled. The tennis thread is the undisputed king of TCU minor sports threads. The Golf thread owes its inspiration and aspirations to the Tennis thread (as I suspect the golf teams themselves aspire to TCU Tennis' record of excellence). And I'm sure @Pharm Frog would say the same about his upstart Volleyball thread.

Thanks for all you guys do to keep the KF.c community informed!
 

jake102

Active Member
US Open draw is out

Norrie is a seed (#26) but his draw sucks. Gets Alcaraz round 1 who is tough. Then likely gets Kecmanovic or Rinderknech, both tough on hard courts. Then gets Tsitsipas. Although in an unfortunate turn, Tsitsipas gets Andy Murry round 1. Bummer as I wanted to see Murray for a few rounds.
 

Jared7

Active Member
This is nowhere near as bad a draw as the previous Slams this year have been. Probably because it's his first ever seed in a Slam; kind of a big accomplishment. Even a 26 seed would be expected to lose (or be an underdog) in the 3rd round and Tsitsipas would be tough and favored. But Cam needs to be worrying about winning them one match at a time and getting back to his top form. Hopefully, he's recovered from his minor nagging injuries (blisters; callouses).
 

Jared7

Active Member
US Open draw is out

Norrie is a seed (#26) but his draw sucks. Gets Alcaraz round 1 who is tough. Then likely gets Kecmanovic or Rinderknech, both tough on hard courts. Then gets Tsitsipas. Although in an unfortunate turn, Tsitsipas gets Andy Murry round 1. Bummer as I wanted to see Murray for a few rounds.
Alcaraz is into the semis at Winston Salem and will play Ymer tonight. Hopefully, he'll get tired out from all the play and Cam will come in refreshed. Alcaraz is Spanish, is currently at ATP#54 and is 19 years old. He too is coming off his first ATP title. It should be a good first round match-up.
 

jake102

Active Member
As I kind of alluded to, Alcaraz was a terrible 1st round opponent for Norrie and he got absolutely smoked. Straight sets, not really close at all. Really tough end to the hardcourt season. Going to need to pump up the serve in the offseason.
 
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