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WF Tennis (WS Open Starts Saturday)

DoublesWake Forest DoublesVirginia DoublesWinner Score
1. S. Mansouri/C. SeraphimL. Cortinteli/R. ShaneUVA8-6
2.J. Ho/N. RubinM. Styslinger/T. KwiatkowskiUVA8-5
3.K. Tabrizi/R. Bogaerts C. Altamirano/JC AragoneDNFMatch tied 7-7 dnf
Order of Finish: 2, 1*
 
It looks like Wake will end ranked 12th going into the NCAA tourney. The selection show will be streamed online at NCAA.com Tuesday at 5:30 PM. Wake should host the first two rounds, and one prediction I saw had #12 Wake vs. #5 TCU in the round of 16, if both teams advance. Wake beat TCU 4-3 in Winston earlier this year, without Noah Rubin in the lineup.
 
are the finals in waco or illinois this year? too bad not athens.
 
Noah Rubin is ACC PoY. Announced today.

Awesome! First ACC player ever to earn Freshman and Player of the Year honors in the same year. First Wake Forest POY ever. Bogaerts and Rubin were both name first team all-ACC and Ho was named third team.
 
How do the pairings work in tennis matches? For example, say we had won the doubles point, and thought we were favorites at 1 and 2, but underdogs at 3-6. What stops us from playing our 3rd best guy against their 6 and punting the 3rd match to give us the best chance overall?
 
I wonder if they have the ability to change the lineups up to match time. So if we put #3 out there vs #6, they could just swap #3 and #6 and still make it 3v3.
 
And along those lines, if Ho is our 3rd best player, why 4th singles?
 
Planned match lineups are presented by each coach prior to the match, without knowledge of the lineup submitted by the other coach. Stacking the lineup is against the rules, though there are obviously often questions about if a lineup is stacked. If a coach thinks the lineup is stacked for an opponent, he can challenge the lineup and there is a formal process for doing so, though it is rarely challenged. At this point in the year, there is a lot of data available to support a specific lineup, so not much switching of places occurs.

Rubin and Bogaerts are clearly our best two players. After that, Mansouri, Ho, and Seraphim seem pretty equal to me, based on results and watching their games. Mansouri and Ho and flipped between 3 and 4 a lot this year, which could be based on practice results or presumed match-ups against other teams. Ho being ranked and the others not is based some on play in the fall and then some just based on who he has played. Ho also has the benefit of playing with Rubin in doubles, which has resulted in a lot of doubles wins.
 
Awesome! First ACC player ever to earn Freshman and Player of the Year honors in the same year. First Wake Forest POY ever. Bogaerts and Rubin were both name first team all-ACC and Ho was named third team.

Wow! Great news.
Would love to see a deep run in the NCAAs.
If we stay healthy, it will happen.
 
To add to what Rafi said, there are some formal rules in the rulebook about moving your lineup around, for example you're not supposed to move a singles player more than one spot up or down from where he was in the previous match. Coaches do sometimes try to move people up or down a spot or two to get a matchup they like, but you have to submit your lineup before you know what the other team is doing, so if the other team moved people too then it can spoil your plan.

At the end of the doubles, you can change your lineup by pulling one of your players out and sliding everybody else up, but can't change it in any other way. That's what Virginia did in the final, they pulled their #2 Mitchell Frank and moved everybody up a slot.

For the postseason tournaments (ACC and NCAA), you have to submit one lineup for the whole tournament and you can't change the order of your players from match to match.

I would say it's not uncommon for coaches to try to gain an advantage by playing one player higher than they should be and one player lower (you could argue Wake has done this all season by putting Mansouri at #3/4 and Seraphim at #5 when Seraphim has had a much better season), but as long as you've been doing it the whole season and the records aren't dramatically different (one guy 11-0 at #5 and the other 0-11 at #4) you can usually get away with it. But coaches generally know the ability of their opponents' players, and so if they tried to put their #1 guy at #4, they would get called out on it.
 
DoublesWake Forest DoublesVirginia DoublesWinner Score
1. S. Mansouri/C. SeraphimL. Cortinteli/R. ShaneUVA8-6
2.J. Ho/N. RubinM. Styslinger/T. KwiatkowskiUVA8-5
3.K. Tabrizi/R. Bogaerts C. Altamirano/JC AragoneDNFMatch tied 7-7 dnf
Order of Finish: 2, 1*

Please forgive my lack of knowledge about tennis, but how are doubles teams chosen?

I find it curious that our best doubles team has neither of our best players on it. I also see the Bryan brothers being a very good doubles team for the US in the Davis Cup, but neither being great at singles. Is it just all about chemistry/teamwork? Do some dominant singles players just struggle playing doubles, or is it more about their playing styles? Would you not want to stick Rubin and Bogaerts on a team and kick ass? I know it's not that simple, but thanks for any help from the tennis experts.
 
Doubles is a much different game than singles. Some people excel more at doubles and make that their specialty like the Bryans. Chemistry is also important.
 
You are correct, there isn't a simple answer.

Doubles is a very different game than singles. Different angles, positioning, shots required and strategy. So there is a certain skill set that is unique to doubles that is independent of singles. Those that choose to play primarily doubles focus their training and practice tailored to doubles specific tennis.

There is also the factor of familiarity and teamwork in doubles. It is a tremendous advantage to know the tendencies and position of your partner in terms of which player will take which shots and consequently how to react and position yourself.

Almost always the people who primarily play singles and play doubles on the side are more talented as tennis players in general than doubles specialists. There is 10x more money in singles along with much more fame and notoriety. Singles self selects the better players. The doubles specialists are able to significantly narrow the talent gap through doubles specific training as well as familiarity/teamwork with a regular partner.

If Federer and Nadal teamed up and practiced together for a couple of months exclusively focusing on doubles, they would beat the Bryans most of the time.

Rubin and Bogaerts basically only care about singles at this stage of their careers. They play and practice doubles primarily because they have to for college tennis. Maneouri and Seraphim likely clicked as doubles teammates some time ago. So they spend more time focusing on doubles (knowing they have no shot making a living playing professional tennis after Wake). In a way this is a huge advantage for Wake in doubles because they can put extremely talented players at 2 and 3 doubles.
 
Doubles is a much different game than singles. Some people excel more at doubles and make that their specialty like the Bryans. Chemistry is also important.

You are correct, there isn't a simple answer.

Doubles is a very different game than singles. Different angles, positioning, shots required and strategy. So there is a certain skill set that is unique to doubles that is independent of singles. Those that choose to play primarily doubles focus their training and practice tailored to doubles specific tennis.

There is also the factor of familiarity and teamwork in doubles. It is a tremendous advantage to know the tendencies and position of your partner in terms of which player will take which shots and consequently how to react and position yourself.

Almost always the people who primarily play singles and play doubles on the side are more talented as tennis players in general than doubles specialists. There is 10x more money in singles along with much more fame and notoriety. Singles self selects the better players. The doubles specialists are able to significantly narrow the talent gap through doubles specific training as well as familiarity/teamwork with a regular partner.

If Federer and Nadal teamed up and practiced together for a couple of months exclusively focusing on doubles, they would beat the Bryans most of the time.

Rubin and Bogaerts basically only care about singles at this stage of their careers. They play and practice doubles primarily because they have to for college tennis. Maneouri and Seraphim likely clicked as doubles teammates some time ago. So they spend more time focusing on doubles (knowing they have no shot making a living playing professional tennis after Wake). In a way this is a huge advantage for Wake in doubles because they can put extremely talented players at 2 and 3 doubles.

Thanks for the help. I'm looking forward to the NCAA's. I hate that the ACC finals didn't make it on ESPN3, but hopefully some NCAA matches will be televised.
GO DEACS!
 
You are correct, there isn't a simple answer.

Doubles is a very different game than singles. Different angles, positioning, shots required and strategy. So there is a certain skill set that is unique to doubles that is independent of singles. Those that choose to play primarily doubles focus their training and practice tailored to doubles specific tennis.

There is also the factor of familiarity and teamwork in doubles. It is a tremendous advantage to know the tendencies and position of your partner in terms of which player will take which shots and consequently how to react and position yourself.

Almost always the people who primarily play singles and play doubles on the side are more talented as tennis players in general than doubles specialists. There is 10x more money in singles along with much more fame and notoriety. Singles self selects the better players. The doubles specialists are able to significantly narrow the talent gap through doubles specific training as well as familiarity/teamwork with a regular partner.

If Federer and Nadal teamed up and practiced together for a couple of months exclusively focusing on doubles, they would beat the Bryans most of the time.

Rubin and Bogaerts basically only care about singles at this stage of their careers. They play and practice doubles primarily because they have to for college tennis. Maneouri and Seraphim likely clicked as doubles teammates some time ago. So they spend more time focusing on doubles (knowing they have no shot making a living playing professional tennis after Wake). In a way this is a huge advantage for Wake in doubles because they can put extremely talented players at 2 and 3 doubles.

Good explanation. I would also add that essentially all really successful doubles players have big serves, which Seraphim and Mansouri both have.
 
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