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Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Wimbledon Junior Acceptances; Final Division I Team Rankings; Men's Recruiting Class Rankings

While I was busy with the NCAAs last week, the Wimbledon Junior acceptances were announced by the International Tennis Federation, and the girls field is notably weaker than the field in the upcoming French Open juniors, which begin on Sunday.

The boys from the United States accepted into the main draw are: Thai Kwiatkowski, Stefan Kozlov, Noah Rubin, Luca Corinteli and Spencer Papa. Martin Redlicki is in the qualifying draw, six places out. US girls in the main draw are Taylor Townsend, Jamie Loeb, Johnnise Renaud and Vicky Duval.  Duval received entry based on her WTA ranking of 287.
Louisa Chirico is in qualifying, three place out of the main draw.

The only boy in the top 45 not entered in the main is No. 40 Roman Safiullin of Russia, so the cutoff ranking number is still very high at 45.  Nick Kyrgios of Australia, the ITF junior No. 1 and Australian boys champioin, is entered and will be the top seed if he stays in the draw. A wild card recipient into the men's main draw at Roland Garrps, Kyrgios won his first round match over ATP veteran Radek Stepanek, but this article about his win says he is still planning to play in the French junior tournament. That will undoubtedly change if he beats No. 10 seed Marin Cilic of Croatia Wednesday.


The girls field has ten top players missing: Recent Italian Open winner Belinda Bencic of Switzerland(4), Francoise Abanda of Canada(5), Christina Makarova of the US(12), Karin Kennel of Switzerland(19), Darya Kasatkina of Russia(22), Sachia Vickery of the US(30), Samantha Crawford of the US(32), Maria Marfutina of Russia(36), Ilka Csoregi of Romania(39) and Anna Danilina of Kazakhstan(48). The rankings in parentheses are at time of acceptance, not this week's.

Makarova is still on the acceptance list for the French; Vickery has withdrawn, as has Duval. Allie Kiick withdrew earlier.  Loeb is heading off to Europe with a tournament title at last week's $10,000 Pro Circuit event in Sumter, SC, where she defeated Brooke Austin 6-4, 6-3 in the final. It is Loeb's third $10K title.

The ITA released the final team rankings for 2013, with NCAA champions Virginia men and Stanford women finishing on top. Virginia moved up from No. 3, while Stanford surged from No. 12. The final individual rankings will be released next week.

The Top 10 men's teams:
1. Virginia
2. UCLA
3. Georgia
4. Ohio State
5. Southern Cal
6. Tennessee
7. Duke
8. Pepperdine
9. Kentucky
10. Ole Miss

The Top 10 women's teams:
1. Stanford
2. Florida
3. Texas A&M
4. North Carolina
5. Georgia
6. Southern Cal
7. UCLA
8. Miami
9. Cal
10. Michigan

The complete rankings can be found at the ITA website.

The Tennis Recruiting Network announced its men's spring recruiting class rankings for 2013, with NCAA champion Virginia taking the top spot, followed by UCLA, North Carolina, Florida and Stanford.  The women's recruiting class rankings will be announced next Monday.

14 comments:

wondering said...

Colette, do you know if Kwiatkowski will be well enough to play Wimbledon? He's had to pull out of all of his planned European events so far, including the French Jr.s

Austin said...

How is Kwiatkowski's behavior now? I remember when he was younger he had a bit of an issue, just curious to hear if he has improved in that area as well.

Brent said...

I saw him play a couple matches last year at Kalamazoo, including a tough three setter against Charles Boyce where he came back from being down a set and down in the second. And I thought he kept it in the ballpark. Passionate for sure, but he was struggling for a part of that match and was on the verge of heading out of the tournament, so if there was a time to lose it, it would've been there - and I don't remember any issues. Small data size, but thought I would share for what it is worth because we all probably saw the '50,000 Balls' footage.

Will be interesting to see how the lineup shakes out for UVA next year. Assuming that nobody goes pro early (and I doubt they will), I would predict they go....

1. Domijan
2. Frank
3. Styslinger
4. R.Shane
5. Kwiatkowski
6. Richmond

But, that still leaves Cornish, Daigle, Corinteli, Polnet, Aragone, and Finals hero Justin Shane on the bench. That is ridiculous depth. I have to believe that Boland believed Domijan or Frank or both were going pro this summer when he lured that recruiting class in - but I don't think either are in great position to jump now.

HooSC said...

UVa is 1 of only 6 teams to win the Indoors, NCAAs and go undefeated since the NCAAs switched to the team format in the 1970s.

Only 4 schools have actually accomplished this feat.

Stanford: 1978, 1995 and 1998

Illinois: 2003

Georgia: 2007

UVa: 2013


Brent said...

HooSC, sounds like you may have an insider's perspective. How do you see UVA's lineup shaping up for next year?

Austin said...

I don't understand why they would all want to go there. UVA is a great academic school and has a 10yr run now of great tennis results, but there cant be any scholarship money available and really good players having to possibly sit on the bench.

Brent said...

I think UVA's #7-12 guys would be top 40 in the country. That is remarkable. And with all the transfers going on nationally, that doesn't really seem to hit them either and they would be the most obvious targets. Fang and Uriguen's little brother are both really good players and are both going to likely go four years without ever playing for anything of significance.

love-tennis said...

Yes Brent and Austin, I agree. I noticed that one boy's player left U of Georgia last year due to no playing time (on good terms), and immediately started playing in the middle of Cal's lineup.

I can't imagine staying at a school for 4 years without playing, unless the school is also very academically prestigious.

Else what is the point of all of that junior tennis?

russ said...

Here's my question regarding all these juniors attending Virginia (and ucla for that matter): How does the school afford these players? The only way I can imagine is that all out of state players somehow gain residency status while going to school during the first year which allows the school to fund players as Virginians after their freshman year. So instead of a full scholarship for Domijan at 50K, it becomes a 40% scholarship fully funding the 21K it costs a resident. Looking at the shane brothers a different calculation is in order. They might be getting less than a full ride, but even a 20% scholarship for 10K would be a good deal if they paid only the 10K difference as Virginia residents which would be less than going on a partial to a non virginia school. Would that make sense? Because otherwise these guys are not only not going to play, they're paying for the privilege of sitting on the bench. What junior in his right mind would want to be in school that doesn't play him and, after all the money the parents spent in the juniors, he still has to fork over tens of thousands of dollars?
And let's say that's all NCAA legal, that out of state players can easily become in state, doesn't that make it unfair for private universities to compete in the allocation of scholarship money?

Austin said...

Residency does not work like that. You are not considered a resident by being a student. You and/or your parents would have to be working in that state and filing taxes for at least a year or more before they would consider you as being in-state.

One way you can get around it is if you major in something that is not offered by a school in your home state. It is called Common Market and you can get in-state tuition, but the school you attend must also provide that feature.

russ said...

Looks pretty easy to me. 1) parents no longer declare you as an a dependent on their taxes 2) pay resident taxes to Virginia, obtain a Virginia driver's license, car & voter registrations 3) make sure your parents contribute less than fifty percent of your financial support which could be calculated as an amount one dollar less than your scholarship. (http://www.virginia.edu/provost/vastatus/faq.html)

Again I'm just trying to figure out how they do it, because it's very hard to impossible to believe they can do it on the standard 4.5 scholarships. There must be some way around that because I simply refuse to believe that a kid with pro aspirations would go to Virginia for less money and playing time than what he would get somewhere else.

Competing with Title IX said...

Some schools will offer a "full ride" to a player but tell them to take 12 hrs per semester. They use the remaining "full time student" semester hours(ex: 18-12=6)and offer the hours to other players as part of a scholarship. The players have 5 yrs to complete their education. Also, some schools have their players sit out the Fall Semester and offer that scholarship to an incoming player. It does help if a State School recruits players from their own State. There are many scholarships( academic, hardship, in state, etc) offered to In State Players. There are also other ways Coaches "extend" the 4-5 scholarships.

How Do They Do It said...

Yep, academic scholarships are possible...that is generally how D3's and Ivy's are able to recruit high ranking players.

HooSC said...

Brent,

I pretty much agree with your lineup. 4 and 5 (Shane and Kwiatkowski could potentially switch places). 6 will be up in the air, though Shane will be in the mix and likely leads based on his confidence building performance in the finals. There are a lot of players with not enough spots available. UVa has definitely been helped by the quality of it's in-state talent in recent years.