Moose Stuff
Active Member
New staff seems very engaged with the other sports already. Whether it’s forced or natural…. I like it.
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TCU Men's Tennis 2021-2022
- Thread starter Jared7
- Start date
New staff seems very engaged with the other sports already. Whether it’s forced or natural…. I like it.
Jared7
Active Member
Well, they're basing that high opinion of Shelton based on his play this fall and some incredibly clutch play in the NCAA's in May and I'm guessing that he also can apparently beat Riffice (the actual defending NCAA champ) in practice, but he's never played consistently at the #1 spot, so for me the jury is still out on whether he's the best in the country. We'll see.
Some are also saying that #4 Tennessee is the real NCAA (and SEC) fave this year and we host them tomorrow at 12:00 p.m. So, it's no time for a let-up. We're 1-5 against them all-time, losing 3-4 to them last year away. But we've never hosted them and we did sweep them 4-0 in 2019 in Knoxville, with W's from Fomba and Jong. Last year was at the Indoor Nationals in Champaign, with W's from Fomba and Jong again over Munday and Prata (and Gray beat Adam Walton), but we lost the doubles point and the bottom 3 positions. Fomba v. Walton (presumably) will be a top-level match. I'm pessimistic about this one, but if we can beat Florida, we can beat the Vols too.
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Jared7
Active Member
It's huge. We've struggled indoors against top competition for years, although last year we did beat then#1 USC inside. Way back in the thread, though, we discussed this and my view is that all these Northern Europeans we've been recruiting recently may be better indoors players than outdoors rather than the warm weather guys in the recent past who grew up playing more outside. Just because of the experience factor, I think we're probably better indoors now than we've ever been. If so, we could be a real threat to win the Indoor Nationals this season if we can make it through the Kickoff Weekend in a few weeks.
This Florida W is going to get a lot of notice and may change the national views of this team, who are going to wake up to our potential. I can't overstate how significant it is. And if we can beat #4 Tennessee after taking down #1 Florida , we could be ranked __... No, I'm not going to jinx it!
Retired Frog
Active Member
So based on this result what do you see as our lineup? Is Vines missing from singles ? Are the doubles pairings the lineup or adjusted due to current injury
Jared7
Active Member
It's fantastic that Sonny is into tennis! I'm impressed!
Longfrog
Active Member
They played Munday at 1, Walton at 2 in their opener.
Retired Frog
Active Member
Also the player rankings seem curious. Neither #1 have current ranking? But Aguilar is #19?
Longfrog
Active Member
Their top 3 are obviously all worthy of the top spot. I saw someone say that they want to mix each of them in, but that if he started Shelton at 1 he'd never let go of it. That seems a little silly to me. If I were to speculate, it would be that he's the coach's son and why not start someone else at 1 to avoid looking like you're playing favorites.
Jared7
Active Member
I think Roditi is going to experiment with the line-up. For now, Fomba and Jong are probably #1 and #2, with Vives slotted for #3 when he returns from COVID protocol. Aguilar is probably next, with the rest fighting for the other slots. Last night, Maxted was ahead of Fearnley, but Jake came through with the clinching W, which was huge. Jirousek is in there and Ruehl played at the top levels for Arizona State, so he's capable too. Doubles was adjusted due to Vives' unavailability - I think that may switch around a little as well. Roditi often adjusts and re-adjusts. We'll see.
Longfrog
Active Member
If Vives is out, we're going with the same lineup in singles, although we might flip Maxted and Fearnley at 5/6. If Vives is in, I think Roditi showed his preference yesterday among the remaining guys. My guess would be
Fomba
Aguilar
Vives
Jong
Jirousek
Fearnley
Longfrog
Active Member
Singles rankings right now aren't worth much. I guess they're based on fall performance, but a lot of the top guys opt out of the fall season and just play pro events.
Jared7
Active Member
Pay no attention to the current rankings. That's almost exclusively based on fall results and most of the top players eschew college events in the fall and try their hand in the pros because there's money there. The ITA rankings really only become relevant later in the Spring after a statistically significant amount of matches between the top players kicks in. Right now, they're just indicative; not predictive.
Jared7
Active Member
Interesting. Both of them are top level. It's going to be really competitive tomorrow.
Longfrog
Active Member
Speaking of rankings, here are the UTR's at present. This doesn't count this week's matches yet. For those unfamiliar, UTR is an all-in formula that tries to count any result, whether pro or amateur. The other ranking systems only look at one or the other.
Fomba (#40)
Vives (#44)
Jirousek (#46)
Jong (#48)
Fearnley (#62)
Aguilar (#68)
Maxted (#120)
Ruehl (#161)
And for comparison, UTenn's top 6
Walton (#22)
Munday (#31)
Bicknell (#33)
Mitsui (#35)
Hudd (#71)
Prata (#245)
Tennessee also plays great doubles, whereas it's been Florida's achilles heel for a while. So we'll have our hands full.
Fomba (#40)
Vives (#44)
Jirousek (#46)
Jong (#48)
Fearnley (#62)
Aguilar (#68)
Maxted (#120)
Ruehl (#161)
And for comparison, UTenn's top 6
Walton (#22)
Munday (#31)
Bicknell (#33)
Mitsui (#35)
Hudd (#71)
Prata (#245)
Tennessee also plays great doubles, whereas it's been Florida's achilles heel for a while. So we'll have our hands full.
Jared7
Active Member
We've traditionally been top-heavy, with strong #1's and #2's. Roditi has been changing this gradually. I agree - depth is now a strength.
Longfrog
Active Member
I agree this team is deeper than we were in the past. But COVID has ironically made all the top teams deeper. Good players are using their 5th year to fill out the roster at the top teams. We benefitted from this by getting Aguilar and Ruehl. Ohio State and UVA will probably play a 5th year transfer at #1 or #2 singles all year.
I think we're also just seeing more transfers in general, maybe because the surge in grad transfers normalized the practice. Hudd and Bicknell transferred to the Vols this year and I think they're both juniors.
Pharm Frog
Full Member
Agree with this…..
Jared7
Active Member
Last year, when we were road warriors virtually all the time, it was great to see the cameras and websites that the other top tennis schools have. We desperately require indoor cameras and I'd like to see a 6th indoor court as well.
