Signing Period Underway; Cal v Stanford, Florida v Georgia Highlight Women's Action this Weekend, Wake v Virginia in Big Men's Match; New ITA Division III Rankings

Yesterday was Signing Day, the first day since last November that a recruit could sign a National Letter of Intent for the 2016-17 academic year.

With a trend to earlier commitments, this signing period does not have the same buzz that November's does, but a few announcements have been made.  Tennis Recruiting Network has been featuring commitment comments for the past several weeks in their Countdown to Signing Day, and this week has featured players who have committed to Texas Tech, Louisville, Virginia, Wake Forest, and Division II Point Loma Nazarene.  Blue Chip Madison Battaglia's announcement, which I wrote, will be out Friday.

Very few signing announcements have been released by schools, but I discovered a couple. The Baylor men's team has announced the signings of two players from Germany: Constantin Frantzen and Bjoern Petersen.

Western Michigan University's women's team has announced the signing of Bulgaria's Gabriela Slavova and the WMU men's team has announced the signing of Kennosuke Nouchi of Japan.

The conference regular season is coming to an end this week and next in Division I college tennis, with several key matchups scheduled for this weekend.  No. 1 Cal will play No. 17 Stanford in Palo Alto Saturday, with Cal's perfect season on the line.  Stanford may not host the first round of the NCAAs if they don't win.  For more on what's at stake in the always spirited rivalry, see this article from the Stanford website.

Georgia's Dan Magill Tennis Center hosts Florida on Friday for key SEC women's match

The SEC women's title will probably be decided Friday night, when No. 4 Florida travels to Athens to take on No. 3 Georgia.  Florida is 11-0 in SEC play, Georgia is 10-1, with its sole conference loss to Vanderbilt.

The ACC men's title will almost certainly go to the winner of Friday's match between Wake Forest and Virginia, which begins at 3 p.m. in Charlottesville. Each has one conference loss, Wake Forest to NC State and Virginia to North Carolina, while UNC, Georgia Tech and Florida State all have three conference losses. For links to live scoring and streaming, see Virginia's website.

The new ITA/Oracle Division III team rankings were released today, with few changes from two weeks ago, the date of the last rankings. Both Emory men and women remain at the top of the lists.

Men:
1. Emory
2. Bowdoin
3. Claremont-Mudd-Scripps
4. Middlebury
5. Chicago
6. Case Western
7. Washington-St. Louis
8. Carnegie Mellon
9. Williams
10. Pomona-Pitzer

Women:
1. Emory
2. Williams
3. Pomona-Pitzer
4. Claremont-Mudd-Scripps
5. Amherst
6. Bowdoin
7. Middlebury
8. Wesleyan
9. Carnegie Mellon
10. Sewanee