Whitties knock of #9 Trinity!

Mar 132011
 

What a special day for Whitman tennis! Today in the Stag-Hen we had the opportunity to play Trinity University (#9 in the nation) for 5th/6th place. Trinity is one of the great programs in DIII and they typically make a good run at the NCAA’s.

Going into the match we knew doubles was critical. On any given day Trinity might have the top 1, 2, 3 doubles line-up in the nation. In fact their #1 team of Cocanoughar/Kowel were the runner-ups at the 2010 NCAA doubles championships. Honestly they don’t drop much from one to three doubles. It is funny how scheduling goes — in the fall Andrew/Conor had the opportunity to play the #1 Trinity Team at the ITA Small College Championships. The Trinity duo ended up winning that match 6-7, 7-6, 10-6. Going into today’s match Andrew/Conor knew they had their hands full, but they also knew they could compete with and beat the TU team. Perhaps more importantly they were hungry for a rematch. Continue reading »

Spring Break Day One

Mar 122011
 

First off I apologize for shortness of this post. It has been a long couple days and we have an early match tomorrow morning.

Thursday we left campus at 9am for the trek to Southern CA. Academically it is tough to miss the last day before spring break — lots of tests and papers are typically due before break. In fact I know last night several of the guys were up to the wee hours of the morning working on papers.

Today was the first day of the Stag-Hen tournament hosted at the campuses of Claremont and Pomona. This is one of the top DIII tournaments of the year. This year the 8 team tournament is loaded with four top 10 teams. This morning we started off the tournament against the #7 team in the nation Kenyon. We had been looking forward to this match for weeks: it isn’t often we get the opportunity to play a top 10 team on a neutral surface. Continue reading »

ITA Small College National Championship

Oct 142010
 

One of the fun things about traveling is the sense adventure. Playing tennis has provided Whitman players (and myself) a great opportunity to explore new parts of the country. This week I was lucky enough to travel to Mobile, AL with Conor and Andrew as well as Coach John, Alyssa Roberg and Elise Otto of the women’s team. Because of the nature of tennis scheduling we really never to get travel or play at the same time as the Women’s team. It was a special treat traveling and hanging out as a group.

The trip to Mobile was certainly an adventure — especially for our talented freshman Andrew La Cava. Prior to the trip Andrew spend almost the entire week in the Whitman health center or the ER. Unfortunately he caught some bug and had a temperature of 103.6. Needless to say he was down and out for the entire week prior to the trip. By the end of the week I was worried if he was going to be able to make the trip. Luckily by Sunday he was feeling well enough to check out of the health center and get in a few practice sessions. Continue reading »

Play-in day at the ITA’s

Oct 142009
 

Today was play-in day at the ITA Small College Nationals. Basically each Small College “event” (NCAA III, NCAA II, NAIA, and JC) have a draw of 8 players. However the Pacific Northwest and Texas regions share a single tournament spot. The winners of these regions arrive a day early and play a winner-in match. Win the match and get into the final eight AND get to play three more matches. Lose and you are done.

Luckily, Matt has been in this situation before and was primed and ready for the pressure of the play-in match. Matt started the match in high gear. Early in the set he broke the Trinity player and raced out to a 3-0 lead. Matt was pounding deep, heavy balls from the backcourt dominating play and pushing his opponent around the court. Matt was able to stay up a break most of the way through the first set but the Trinity player was battling and playing better tennis. Midway through the 1st set he started serving and volleying which made it harder to Matt to get a groove on his returns. Matt served for the first set 5-3 but was broke. The Trinity player then had a pretty easy hold to even the match at 5-5. With Matt serving at 5-5 the Trinity player played three great points to go up 0-40. All the momentum was now on the Trinity side of the court. This is where Matt’s experience really came through..he took his time between points and grinded out 6 straight points to hold serve. Really this was the turning point in the match. Matt seized the momentum and the Trinity player seemed to lose his focus. From 5-5 0-40 down Matt went on a tear to hold and break winning the first set 7-5. Second set was all Matt all the time. In fact Matt only lost 3 points in the 2nd set winning 6-0.

This puts Matt into the elite group of 8 and he is guaranteed three more matches. Tomorrow at 10:30am he plays Middlebury. As usual I’ll post twitter updates on the blog…http://whitmantennis.blogspot.com

Also very hot and humid conditions today. Was over 80 degrees with 94% humidity. Weather forecast doesn’t look good for tomorrow so everyone please do their best sun dance!

Play in day at the ITAs

Oct 152008
 

Today was the play-in day for the ITA Small College National Championships. The ITA Small College Championships is an 8 person/team draw. However because of geographic issues the winners of the Northwest and Southwest regions play-off a day early to determine the 8th tournament spot. These play off matches are pressure packed — win and you are guaranteed 3 matches, lose and you out of the tournament.

Day started off well for Whitman as Matt Solomon played solid tennis defeating the #1 player from Trinity 6-4, 7-6. Matt showed great composure rallying from 1-5 down in the 2nd (including a match point) to win the match. Hats off to Matt for keeping his composure and battling back against tough odds to beat a talented opponent.
In the afternoon match Matt and Etienne Moshevich faced off against a fiesty #1 doubles team from Trinity. In the first set the Fighting Squirrels started off strong going up a quick break. However the Trinity team fought their way back into the match and served for the 1st set at 6-5. At this point Matt and ET played a brilliant return game sending the 1st set into a breaker. In the breaker it was all Whitman as Matt and ET cruised to a 7-3 victory. However the Trinity team stepped up their play winning the second set 6-4. At the ITA’s doubles is determined by a match breaker in the third set. Matt and ET started off strong and took an early 5-2 lead. However the Trinity duo when on a streak bombing in 1st serves and crushing every return they laid a racket on. Their strong play lead to a 10-7 tie break victory.
Tomorrow at 8:30am Matt playes against the #1 from Gustavus Aldophus. I will try to send twitter updates to the blog after each set.