Great night, rough score

What a great night of tennis! It was so gratifying to have a PACKED house supporting our team as we took on the defending national champions UC Santa Cruz. When I mean packed house we are talking over 200 people in the balcony of our indoor center. And boy were they treated to some great tennis.

Much like last night the doubles came down to the end. Bit of a topsy turvy affair. At #2 doubles (Quin and Christoph) we were close but never saw a break point and lost 8-6. At #3 doubles Jasper and Jake served well and were never broken. We had quite a few break points and at 7-8 had 2 matches points (15-40) but couldn't put a return in play. Was nice to see the seniors really rally in win 7-4 in the breaker.

Now #1 doubles was one interesting affair. At one point Matt and Jeffrey were down 2-5 (two breaks) and then somehow managed to real off 5 straight games to go up 7-5. I gotta hand it to Matt and Jeffrey they really hung in the match and turned the match around. We had a number of chances to win...I think we had match points in 3 different games! Just didn't up being our night as the Slugs took it a breaker making the team score 2-1.

Singles were all tight and I felt like we were in every match. The #1 match was an absolute heavy weight bout. Both players were hitting the ball a ton and pushing each other around the court. In the end Pybas played great and simply won the match. At #3 Jeffrey Tolman had a complete turn around from the previous night and played some great tennis. Actually one of my coaching highlights was watching the change in Jeffrey. He played with passion, energy and produced some stunning tennis. In the early stages of each set he was up a break .. hats of the Santa Cruz player who weather some unbelievable shot making from Jeffrey and ended winning 6-4, 6-4.

At this point we are down 1-4 and both Christoph and Chris had dropped the 1st set. However both of these young men showed incredible composure with the match on the line..neither gave an inch and really dictated play in the 2nd set. Chris ended up winning the 2nd set in his match and all eyes were focused on Christoph. I liked how Christoph stuck to his guns and kept going after his serve and approaching on every short ball. He forced a tiebreak and earned himself a set point (return). In the end he dropped the breaker 8-6 and the match 6-2, 7-6. That put Santa Cruz over the top 5-1.

We went into the match a bit more shorted handed that we wanted. Not only were we planning on having Etienne play (who couldn't go after an afternoon hit) but we also lost Nadeem (our #5) to a sore shoulder. This however did give Jake an opportunity to play 5 and put Conor Holton-Burke in at #6 (Conor was so excited I thought he might burst).

Very proud of how well our guys played and more importantly how they competed. One of the more fun matches I have been apart of ... great crowd energy, drama and fantastic tennis.

PS David Deming was keeping the twitter feed going. No way I could type that fast!

Whitman 1 UCSC 8

Doubles

1. Matt Solomon/Jeffrey Tolman lost Pybas/Vartabedin 9-8 (3)

2. Quin Miller/Christoph Fuchs lost Koening/Stanley 8-6

3. Jasper Follows/Jake Cappel def Ulrich/Larson 9-8 (4)

Singles

1. Solomon lost Pybas 6-4, 6-1

2. Bailey lost Vartabedin 6-4, 2-6, 6-3

3. Tolman lost Koening 6-4, 6-4

4. Fuchs lost Chiba 6-2, 7-6 (6)

5. Cappel lost Morrill 6-3, 6-3

6. Holton-Burke lost Halabi 2-6, 6-1, 10-8

By the hair of our chinny chin chin

Unfortunately its late so this short post won't do justice to our LCSC match. First matches of the year are always scary and this proved to be no different. We knew we would be in a for a battle, but who knew it would be a 5-4 match that featured five three-setters!

Since the start of practice last week we have been focusing on doubles. The 9-point system really places a huge emphasis on doubles. A strong doubles team can go up 3-0 in pretty quick order. Fortunately for us that is exactly what we did. At #1 Matt Solomon/Jeffrey Tolman were down a break for most the entire match but broke serve at 7-8 forcing a tie-break. They saved their best for last, stringing together first serves and returns to take the breaker 7-4. At #2 doubles Christoph Fuchs/Quin Miller realized how much fun Matt/Jeff were having and decided that they too would win in a breaker. Our senior #3 team of Jake Cappel/Jasper Follows decided to take pity on a poor stressed out coach (me) and post a solid 8-4 victory.

All the singles matches were about as tight as they could be. Jeffrey (#2) had his trial by fire losing 6-1, 6-3. Not his best match, but the first one is always rough and I'm sure he is glad to have it behind him. At #3 Chris Bailey worked hard and put up a battle but in the end lost 4-6, 6-1, 6-1. Christoph has been playing great tennis the past couple weeks and he had wonderful win at #4 2-6, 6-1, 6-3. It was so gratifying to see him bounce back after a quick first set to take the next two sets.

Match score at this point is 4-1 and Matt Solomon is in a 3rd set battle at #1 singles. Things looked pretty bleak midway through the third as Matt gets broken to go down 3-4 AND his hand and arm are cramping. Now he is down a break, can't hold his racket and is struggling a bit with his movement. Matt showed great fortitude after a short trainer break. Instead of playing long grueling baseline points, Matt starts taking chances and shortening the points. Not sure if was the fact that Matt changed his game plan, started hitting a bit bigger or his opponent had a let down. But Matt ends up winning three straight games to win 6-2, 6-7, 6-4 AND seal the team win. What a great way for Matt to start off the year.

Our other seniors didn't fare quite so well. Nadeem came back from 5-7, 1-5 to win the second set but eventually lost 10-7 in the match breaker. At #6 Jake was cruising along winning the 1st set 6-4 and was up a break 3-0 when Matt clinched the team match. At that point Jake had a let down and ended up losing 4-6, 6-4, 14-12.

Real proud of the effort and maturity of the team tonight. Very good win to start off the year. Tomorrow we take on #1 ranked (and defending National Champions) UC Santa Cruz at 6pm.

Whitman 5 LCSC 4

Doubles

#1 Matt Solomon/Jeff Tolman def Ivan Krijanto/Zhai Hwa Chong 9-8

#2 Quin Miller/Christoph Fuchs def Ben Robert/Cesar Uauy 9-8

#3 Jasper Follows/Jake Cappel def Jeff Lowndes/Tyler Oram 8-4

Singles

#1 Matt Solomon def Zhia Hwa Chong 6-2, 6-7, 6-4

#2 Jeffrey Tolman lost Ivan Krijanio 6-1, 6-3

#3 Chris Bailey lost Ben Robert 4-6, 6-1, 6-1

#4 Christoph Fuchs def Oliver Sindayigaya 2-6, 6-1, 6-3

#5 Nadeem Kassam lost Arslan Mermut 6-4, 6-7, 10-7

#6 Jake Cappel lost Cesar Uauy 4-6, 6-4, 14-12

Free tennis clinic

Thursday afternoon the men's tennis team gave a free clinic for area junior players. Participants ranged in age from 5 to 12 and all had a blast! Certainly was fun for the Whitman players to share their knowledge of the game with the local youth.

We are hoping that some of these future stars come out and watch us compete this weekend. Whitman plays LCSC Friday 1pm and UC Santa Cruz Saturday 6pm

Weekend preview

Great weekend of play on tap at the Bratton Tennis Center this weekend. Tennis fans will be treated to three-days of great play with Whitman hosting Lewis-Clark State College, University of Idaho, Linfield and UC Santa Cruz.

Thanks to all who helped make this weekend possible: Coaches Jeffrey Beaman (Idaho) and Kai Fong (LCSC) both agreed to move our scheduled matches in Lewiston to Walla Walla. Without moving those matches it would not have been possible to bring the Banana Slugs to town. Christine Beito at Stone Creek Manor for helping with housing and snacks for the weekend. For those traveling to Walla Walla and want a special experience check out the Stone Creek Manor...you won't be disappointed! Pizza Pipeline for providing pizza for the Saturday evening match. Best Western Walla Walla Suites for helping with accommodations. The Whitman Alumni Athletic Club (W Club) for helping make the weekend possible. And the Thyken family for helping with housing.

The feature match for the weekend is a Saturday 6pm showdown between defending NCAA III champions UC Santa Cruz (currently ranked #1) and host Whitman College (currently ranked #26). Admission is free and Pizza Pipeline will be providing free slices of pizza to spectators. Show up early while the the pizza and tennis action is hot!

Schedule of play

Friday 1pm Whitman vs Lewis Clark State College

Friday 6pm UC Santa Cruz vs LCSC

Saturday 10am Idaho vs UCSC

Saturday 2pm Idaho vs LCSC

Saturday 6pm Whitman vs UCSC

Sunday 10am UCSC vs Linfield

Lewis-Clark State College comes into the weekend with a 2-0 record and boosts an roster of players from across the globe. The LCSC warriors are a perennial power in NAIA and start the year ranked #20. A bit of a new look for the always tough Warriors. While they graduated a few standout players they appear to have reloaded and are off to a good start. The past few years the Whitman vs LCSC matches have produced some exciting and incredibly close matches. Last year Whitman squeaked by LCSC 5-4 when an unfortunate injury forced an LCSC retire at #4 singles. In the 2007-2008 season LCSC nipped Whitman 4-3 in Lewiston but later in the year Whitman avenged the loss with a home 7-2 victory. These teams tend to bring out the best in each other and the Friday match should be great.

It is a real treat to have the NCAA I Vandals of Idaho come to town. Its not often that DI teams in any sport make the trek to Walla Walla and we are grateful to have them. Coach Jeffrey Beaman has done a tremendous job building the Idaho program. Under Beaman's leadership the Idaho team has been knocking on the door of the NCAA I rankings. They dropped a couple of matches last weekend in California losing to Nevada 4-3 and #46 Fresno State 4-0. Idaho is a very talented team that in recent years have given ranked DI programs trouble.

UC Santa Cruz comes into the weekend as the #1 ranked team in NCAA III. At the end of last year they were playing hot tennis and worked their way out of a tough West region to win the NCAA III team title. This is a bit of a rebuilding year for the Banana Slugs as they graduated five of the last year's top six players. For most teams, graduating the majority of one's starting line-up would be impossible to overcome. The Slugs, however have a virtual tennis farm in Santa Cruz and Coach Hanson maybe the best coach in the nation at player development. The Slugs enter the weekend at 0-2 but both of those losses were to the hands of NCAA I programs (UC Davis and Santa Clara). Both of those matches were close and the Slugs proved they could compete with the DI programs. The Slugs are lead by talented lefty Bryan Pybas (#10 in the West Region) and senior Marc Vartabedian (#19 in the West Region). The Slug doubles team of Pybas/Vartabedian is currently ranked #8 in NCAA III.

The Linfield Wildcats are coming to town for a 10am Sunday showdown against UC Santa Cruz. The Wildcats are perennial tennis powers of the Northwest Conference finishing in the top three for the past decade. Currently ranked #12 in the West Region, Linfield is lead by talented junior Mark Magdaong (#12 in West Region) and senior Kyle Anderson (#22 in the West Region).

Host Whitman has seven seniors on their roster and hope to show they have the talent to play on the national stage. Whitman is currently ranked #6 in the West and #26 in the nationally. The Fighting Squirrels have been competitive with some of the top teams in the nation but haven't had a big win in the past two-seasons. However all signs point to a strong year for the Squirrels. They return most of their NCAA III qualifying team from last year, they get a shot in the arm with the return of Matt Solomon, and they have a talented newcomer in Jeffrey Tolman. Basically the same team is back from last year with two "new" players at the top.

To be competitive against the top DIII teams in the nation Whitman needs another strong year from senior Matt Solomon. Last spring Solomon transferred to Boise State where he had the opportunity to play for one of the top DI programs in the nation. The BSU Broncos made it to the round of 16 at the NCAA's and Solomon was a factor in their success. After playing against the top DI programs in the nation (Virginia, Stanford, Pepperdine, Ohio State to name a few) Solomon should be able to hang with any player in the nation. At the ITA Small College Nationals in October Solomon played great tennis showing he was a force in DIII tennis. Solomon enters the weekend ranked #11 in the nation and #3 in West.

Three-star freshman Tolman is a dangerous, talented player. In the fall, Tolman advanced to the finals of the Northwest Regional singles tournament before losing to teammate Solomon in three hard fought sets. During the Northwest Regional event Tolman knocked off #2 seed and NWC Player of the Year Joel Trudel. Tolman is currently ranked #9 in the West Region.

Whitman will also need the return of a healthy Etienne Moshevich. Moshevich spent the fall in London and spent much of the summer rehabilitating an injury. Last season's departure of Solomon gave Moshevich the opportunity to play #1 and he had great results before an injury limited his playing time. Moshevich showed he had to the game to play at high level when he upset the #1 player from DI Montana and later in the season had a match point before losing to eventual NCAA III quarter-finalist Will Zhang (Chicago).

Junior Chris Bailey gives Whitman a potent 1-4 punch. Last year Bailey had a bit of an up and down season. Some great wins but he struggled during Whitman's spring break trip in South Carolina. With the departure of Solomon and the injury to Moshevich, Bailey was often thrust into the #1 singles slot. The experience of playing #1 for a portion of last year gives Bailey valuable experience going into his junior year.

After the top four, Whitman has a number of players to chose from. They return Nadeem Kassam, Jake Cappel and Quin Miller who played #4-#6 on last year's NCAA team. They also have a solid lower player in Sophomore Adriel Borshanksy who last year defeated the #6 players from nationally ranked programs Chicago, Depauw, and Carleton. Seniors Christoph Fuchs and Jasper Follows have both played doubles at the NCAA team tournament and figure to play important roles this year. Whitman also has a trio underclassmen that will see significant playing time: sophomore Conor Holton-Burke posted a perfect 14-0 record last year and freshmen Sam Sadeghi and Matt Tesmond both had good fall Regional results knocking off top players from rival conference schools. Lastly seniors David Deming and Thomas Roston are experienced match players who will rotate into the line-up.

Leader for the week

As a team we talk a lot about leadership and developing positive characteristics. One of our team rituals is at the beginning of each week select our "stage" leader All members of the team vote for a player who was the leader (or inspired them) the previous week. Its a pretty wide open question: players look at contributions to the team, citizenship, academics, and effort (among other things).

The leader of the week gets the yellow practice jersey. For our team this jersey is similar to being a stage leader at the Tour de France (ala the yellow jersey). They were, in fact, the leader of one stage in our amazing journey. I can think of no higher honor than having your peer group recognize you inspired them. In practice the "stage leader" wears the jersey with honor and pride.

The leader for our first stage was sophomore Conor Holton-Burke. Conor is a sophomore from Boulder, CO. Everyone that nominated Conor noted his effort in practice and the extra mile he goes to improve his game and help those around him. Besides being a workhorse on the court Conor is an amazing student. I've had players win the prestigious NCAA postgraduate scholarship, a Watson fellowship, a Fulbright, and the Trudeau scholarship. Although Conor is only a sophomore I would have to say he is the best student I've seen at Whitman. This is quite an accomplishment considering our team GPA has been over a 3.2 the past 10 years and the past six semesters over a 3.4!

Congratulations to Conor Holton-Burke.

Learning about sleep with Dr Simon

Sunday night the members of the Whitman tennis team were treated to a very special team dinner with Dr Richard Simon. Dr Simon is an internationally known researcher and expert in sleep and sleep disorders. Dr Simon was recently featured in a HBO documentary "Wide Awake". More importantly Dr Simon played varsity tennis at Whitman (graduated 1972) before graduate school at University of Chicago!

Some of the interesting facts about sleeping

• College students need 9 to 9.5 hours of sleep (most get under 7)
• Getting only 6 hours of sleep is equivalent to functioning under 2 drinks
• If someone only gets 6 hours of sleep their reaction time decreases about 100 milliseconds. How does correspond to athletics? In baseball a fastball takes about 450 milliseconds to leave the pitchers hand and travel to the plate. Obviously 100 millisecond slower reaction time would make a huge difference
• A study of second serves with Whitman College tennis players about 6 years ago found a 10% improvement in 2nd serves with an extra 2 hours of sleep!
• It takes about an hour to actually become fully awake. In fact for optimal "performance" Dr Simon recommends waking up an hour before class (athletics) even at the expense of less sleep. For example a day of poor nutrition probably won't have a huge impact on athletic performance but a poor night of sleep can be disastrous.

We also spent time discussing strategies for shifting one's time clock to adjust different time zones, sleep disorders, and why the Seattle Mariners will never win the World Series.

Thanks to Dr Simon for taking time out of his busy schedule to have dinner with the tennis team!

This is the first of a series of team dinners with successful professionals in a wide variety of fields.

MLK Day brings great weather to Walla Walla

Classes start tomorrow but the weather was too good not to play outside. Mother Nature blessed the Walla Walla area with temperatures over 65 today and several members of the team got outside and enjoyed the warm weather.

Mens tennis GPA -- 3.42!

Going to be a great week for Whitman tennis -- we start practicing this week! School starts tomorrow after the long winter break and I know the guys are gearing up for the year.

Just got the team GPA back from the registers office -- a 3.42! Wow! Pretty incredible average GPA for the team. Needless to say I'm very impressed with their efforts in the classroom.