The 40 & Over 4.0 women favorites to make the semis are now Florida, SoCal, and Southwest with Mid-Atlantic, PNW, and Intermountain trying to find a way in to the last spot. Just an 11% chance of four 4-0 teams, no change of five.
For the 40 & Over 4.0 men, there remain five teams with a great chance of a semis berth, Eastern, Florida, Midwest, Southern, and Texas, with New England trying to play spoiler and get in. There is still a 2% chance of five 4-0 teams, and 19% chance of four of them.
The 40 & Over 4.5 women's favorites are New England, NorCal, and Mid-Atlantic, with Florida or Southern being most likely for the last spot, but Midwest, PNW, and Texas lurking. Just a 2% chance of four 4-0 teams.
Then the 40 & Over 4.5 men have a pretty clear four favorites in Mid-Atlantic, NorCal, SoCal, and Southern, Midwest and Missouri Valley trying to play spoiler. Just a 7% chance of four 4-0 teams.
Moving to 40 & Over 3.0 women, Eastern, Middle States, Midwest, NorCal, and SoCal all have a better than 50% chance of making the semis, Florida, Mid-Atlantic, and Texas lurking. It appears there will be a 3-1 team in the semis.
And the 40 & Over 3.0 men, Florida, Intermountain, PNW, and Southern are all favorites for the semis, MoValley and Texas could spoil that grouping. It appears this will be tight with two 3-1 teams expected to make it.
The 18 & Over division has the 3.5 women playing and five teams have a great chance at the semis, those being Eastern, Florida, Intermountain, PNW, and SoCal, with NorCal trying to play spoiler. There is a 1% chance of five 4-0 teams, 16% of four.
Last, the 18 & Over men favorites are Intermountain, Mid-Atlantic, Middle States, Midwest, and SoCal with NorCal trying to find their way in. A 1% chance of five 4-0 teams, 7% of four.
Good luck everyone!
Kevin - except for only a couple of players at the Men's 4.0 40+ that were clearly out of level (e.g., MidWest top self rate player), I think this was one of the most competitive and fair Nationals played in years with many matches being decided by 3rd set tie breaker courts and no team was over matched during the weekend. I know your team was a spoiler for the MidWest since they were ready to take the 4th spot on Sunday before you took them down. Also need to figure out a better random draw so no more than 4 undefeated teams can finish out the weekend. This would have happened if you did not take down MidWest.
ReplyDeleteDon, I agree it was generally competitive. While we went only 1-3, we had a really tough draw (two 4-0 teams, two 3-1 teams, one of those losses to a 4-0 team) and I personally had three match tie-breaks, so very close, and some others did too. Any lopsided scores were usually matchups of stronger/weaker players so expected. But it was fun to play spoiler.
DeleteI agree there needs to be something to not send home a 4-0 team, PNW teams saved the USTA the last two weekends with upset wins in the last round.
Curious how your ratings compared to your eye test on the players you played at Nationals?
ReplyDeleteThe ratings based on my observations were true to the TennisRecord ratings that I saw. Most of the top players were top players for their teams and didn't see too many sandbaggers out there destroying the competition but I'm sure there were a couple. As Kevin indicated above, a lot of 3rd set tie breakers that could have drastically changed the outcome for many teams. Our Mid Atlantic team could have been 3-0 or 0-3 based on each 3rd set tie breaker in the match. We cleared the bench on the last match since we had 19 players register for Nationals and wanted everyone to experience playing so that was great to have everyone play. Still would have been better if we had made it to the Sunday Semifinals and Finals but we had our shot...
ReplyDelete