NEPSAC Class B Tennis Tournament Outlook

NEPSAC Class B Tennis Tournament Outlook

I just realized that Cheshire Academy is a Class A School, I'm an idiot. Anyway here are my new rankings, click here for the Old Class B Rankings, I didn't bother to take Cheshire out of the old rankings.

1. Brunswick School
Brunswick beat Hopkins 4-3 this past week, this result will give Brunswick the number 1 seed for the Class B Tournament.  Hopkins is the only team that can stop Brunswick from three-peating.

2. Hopkins School
I'm a little bit surprised that Hopkins lost to Brunswick but there's no reason why Hopkins shouldn't be able to beat Brunswick in NEPSACs.  I'm concerned that the committee is going to give the second seed to an ISL team (Belmont Hill) when Hopkins is a MUCH stronger team than Bel Hill.

3. Belmont Hill School
As much as I want an ISL school to win New England's there's really no chance that Bel Hill will beat either Hopkins or Brunswick.  Best case scenario is that Belmont Hill gets the second seed and the tournament committee puts Hopkins and Brunswick on the same side of the draw allowing Bel Hill to sneak to the finals and lose.  Realistically I really don't see this team winning more than one match.

4. Nobles & Greenough School
If Nobles is able to avoid Hopkins and Brunswick first round they could win a match.

5. Roxbury Latin School
I'm guessing that RL will probably draw either Hopkins or Brunswick.

6. St. Paul's School
Unless given an easy draw this team will probably bow out first round.

7. King Low Heyward Thomas School
King should pick up the FAA's third birth into the tournament.

8. Moses Brown School
This 8th spot is a real toss up and its annoying that the Moses Brown Athletic Website doesn't have any scores posted but this team isn't bad.

Teams on the bubble:

Tabor Academy
Tabor has a win and a loss versus Moses Brown but what could kill their tournament hopes is a lopsided 9-4 loss to BB&N.

Green Farms Academy
Green Farms has a 4-3 loss to King but if the tournament committee elects to take a 4th FAA team then Green Farms could sneak in.

New Power Rankings! (Seventh Edition)

New Power Rankings! (Seventh Edition)

 Click here for the Previous Power Rankings.  And just a quick note, if you click on a school in the power rankings list it will take you to the respective school's team page.

The Power Rankings are a weekly strength assessment of each team and generally speaking the rankings are used for the basis of predictions for the coming week as upsets rarely seem to happen.

1. Belmont Hill School (Previously: 1)

Belmont Hill pulled out a tough 8-7 victory over Nobles to essentially claim the ISL title and possibly a number 2 seed in the Class B Tournament.

2. Nobles School (3)

Although Nobles lost to Belmont Hill, they slide up one spot in the rankings because it was a much more competitive match than the Milton-Belmont Hill one.  Nobles had a convincing win over St. Paul's on Saturday 10-5.

3. Milton Academy (2)

After Milton's wins over Andover and Exeter, it looks like they might have a good enough resume to pick up the second seed in the Class A Tournament.  On the other hand, it's been a tough week publicity week for Milton after the Controversial Quotes Post.

4. Roxbury Latin School (4)

Other than New England's, Roxbury Latin only has easy matches remaining on its schedule.

5. St. Paul's School (5)

St. Paul's had a big win over Rivers on Friday by a score of 9-6.  The loss to Nobles won't matter on Selection Day when the Class B Tournament is determined because St. Paul's will be safely in.

6. Rivers School  (7)

Rivers is on pace to have its best record in the past half-decade.

7. St. George's School (8)

St. George's has a big match versus BB&N this Wednesday.

8. St. Mark's School (10)

St. Mark's beat Thayer this past week and they have a showdown with St. Seb's on Wednesday.

9. Middlesex School  (11)

Middlesex has a tough stretch coming up with matches against RL and Belmont Hill; they picked up a big win versus BB&N on Saturday.

10. Thayer Academy (12)

Thayer has the potential to pick up another win versus maybe Collins-less Governor's on Wednesday.

11. Brooks School (13)

Brooks has winnable matches this week against Middlesex, Thayer, and St. Seb's.

12. Groton School (14)

Groton beat BB&N on Wednesday but they have a tough schedule down the stretch.

13. St. Sebastian's School (15)

St. Seb's had a big win against Governor's on Friday.

14. BB&N (7)

BB&N had a rough week and badly missed a few starters in both matches.  After consecutive lopsided losses to St. Paul's, Groton and Middlesex, BB&N has slipped all the way to 14th in the power rankings.

15. Governor's Academy (9)

With Nate Collins injured this team seems to have lost its fire as Governor's dropped matches to St. Seb's, St. Paul's and St. Mark's this past week.

16.  Lawrence Academy (16)

Lawrence has won 2 sets in 11 matches this season for an average of .18 Sets Per Match.  I think I just created a new statistic right there, that could be my legacy.  I'm trying to write the most out of a "bad situation" because I haven't done much coverage of this team all year besides saying that if Lawrence had beaten Belmont Hill it would've been the biggest upset in ISL Sports History.

Brunswick Tennis beats Hopkins 4-3 in exciting showdown!

Brunswick Tennis beats Hopkins 4-3 in exciting showdown!

This post was taken directly from the Hopkins website and I did not contribute at all to the post.  I just thought that this match would be interesting to my readers.

    Both the Hopkins and the Brunswick boys varsity tennis teams came into today's match knowing a lot was at stake.  Both teams had been undefeated in Fairchester Tennis League competition up to this point, and Brunswick was the New England Prep School Team Champion in the "B" division in 2009.

    The match began with Brunswick veteran Kyle Wolstencroft at #4 singles soundly defeating Hopkins' Luke Foreman 6--0, 6--1, with superior pace and experience.  But Hopkins #1 Nolan Paige evened the score by upending a determined Sam King, 6--1, 6--4, using punishing, accurate, and aggressive topspin ground strokes to force play, and even the match at 1--1.  It turned out that these two matches were the only matches to be decided in two sets.

    At #2 doubles, the Hopkins team of Alec & Michael Bartimer gained an advantage for Hopkins with steady and penetrating cross court ground strokes along with opportunistic volleys to gain a 6--2, 4--6, 6--1 victory.  In a match at #1 doubles with hard hitting, and a lot of determination on both sides, tri-captains Bobby Berkowitz and Jerrod Dobkin eventually triumphed over Brunswick's Matt Mackin and Matt Shang in a see-saw battle, 6--3, 1--6, 6--4.

    But this was as far as it went for Hopkins today.  At #3 doubles, Alex Blythe and Ryan Daley won the first set against Robbie Ravelli and Luca Knupfer, but were unable to counter the strong net play of the Brunswick team in the second set.  The third set went back and forth; unfortunately for Hopkins, some unforced errors at crucial points undermined the Hilltoppers' cause, and this gave the Brunswick team a hard earned 3--6, 6--1, 7--6 victory.

    What remained on the courts were the #2 and #3 singles matches.  Hopkins' Russell Einbinder at #2, after losing the first set, came back strong to win the second set, and both players were on serve in the 3rd set at 2--2 when Russell sustained severe leg cramps and had to retire.

    This left the match score at 3--3 with Brunswick's John Brosens pitted against Hopkins' Brian Astrachan.  Both players battled fiercely, but in the end Brosens' stronger serve and harder hit forehand proved to be the difference, with the score ending up 6--3, 4--6, 6--4 to give Brunswick the match and the Fairchester Tennis League title.

Source: Hopkins Athletic Website


I didn't realize that the FAA plays a 4 singles, 3 doubles format.  The New England's match will be different because it's a 7-point format.

Results from Today

Results from Today

Nobles beat St. Paul's 10-5

Middlesex beat BB&N 11-4

Friday: St. Seb's beat Governor's Academy 8-7
Nate Collins didn't play because of a knee injury.

Friday: Brunswick beat Hopkins 4-3
This was a really tight match and I didn't realize it but the FAA plays a strange 4 singles and 3 doubles format.



Comment with Scores.

NEPSAC Class A Prep Tennis Rankings

NEPSAC Class A Prep Tennis Rankings

UPDATED NEPSAC Class A Prep Tennis Rankings

I didn't realize until just now that Cheshire Academy is a Class A team so I just added them in as the number 8 team into the tournament.

Click here for the previous NEPSAC Class A Tennis Rankings.

1. Hotchkiss School Tennis (previously: 1)

Hotchkiss remains atop my Class A rankings and will likely be the number 1 seed in the NEPSAC Tournament. They've pretty much cleaned up except for a 7-0 (scrimmage) loss to Brunswick and a tight 4-3 win against Class B opponent Cheshire Academy.  Hotchkiss is the cream of the crop from the Founders League.  Hotchkiss is by far the best Class A team.

2. Milton Academy Tennis (3)

Milton won a very close match against Phillips Academy- Andover this past week and is likely to get the 2nd seed in the NEPSAC Tournament.  Milton will have its hands full if it plays Hotchkiss but it could potentially pull an upset off.

3. Deerfield Academy Tennis (2)

Deerfield had a slightly more convincing win (than Milton) over Phillips Academy (5-2 instead of 4-2) but it's unlikely that the committee gives both seeds to Founders teams in my opinion.

4. Loomis Chaffee School Tennis (4)

Loomis sits comfortably at the fourth position. They've beaten everyone except Deerfield and it was only a 4-3 loss.  They don't play Hotchkiss until after NEPSACs.

5. Phillips Academy- Andover Tennis (5)

Phillips has close losses to Milton, Deerfield and (Class B) Roxbury Latin.  This squad beat Taft 4-3 at the beginning of the season.

6. Taft School Tennis (6)

Taft has close losses to Hotchkiss (5-2), Phillips (4-3), and Loomis (4-3).

7. Choate Rosemary Hall Tennis (7)

Choate has pulled out a lot of close matches this year but they are likely to get crushed by any team they face first round.

8. Cheshire Academy Tennis (Unranked)

I messed up, I thought that Cheshire was Class B.  Although they are ranked 8th I think that this is the only team that could possibly beat Hotchkiss in the Class A Tournament.  The only reason this team isn't ranked higher is that it lost to Choate 5-2.

As you can tell not much has changed since the last time I did the rankings. Stay tuned because I'll do a full breakdown of the bracket when it comes out.

Did I leave anyone out? Comment below.

Controversial Quotes from NEPSAC Tennis Websites

Controversial Quotes from NEPSAC Tennis Websites

Every now and then I come across a quote where I just think, "Wow! Did he really just say that?"  This is one of those quotes and for the record I didn't say it, I'm just posting it.

This is taken straight from the Phillips Andover site's writeup about the Phillips Academy-Milton Academy match.

A pivotal matched occurred at third singles, where Milton’s Anthony Blake, whose forehand, if not his sportsmanship, has markedly improved since last year, was involved in a struggle with Andover’s Michael Kontaxis.  Both Blake and Milton’s Josh Cohen were almost called off the court by the coaches for their loud, disruptive behavior and code violations, which in Blake’s case included taunting and insults.  Andover coach Greg Wilkin had to stop coaching other matches to monitor their calls and behaviors.


Click here for the full writeup.


Another interesting quote from the Loomis Chaffee website, thanks for the tip:

Loomis faced Deerfield yesterday afternoon here on the Island. It was an epic battle. The tennis matches were high quality. The intensity was at an all-time high. Unfortunately, due to this high intensity and rivalry, sportsmanship was at an all-time low, which did not bring out the best in either team.

Results from Wednesday

Results from Wednesday

Belmont Hill beat Nobles today 8-7! This match was much closer than I expected and apparently the match was tied at 7-7 before Jack Welch finished his set at third singles for the 8th and deciding point.

The chart below is pretty self explanatory but I want to point out a few things.

•  In a battle of freshman phenoms, Carl Reid dropped his first set of the season and this result could potentially influence the MVP race by letting Nate Collins and Andrew Lebovitz back into the picture.  
• Will Samuels had a very dominant match at sixth singles, losing only a few games over the course of the match.
• Belmont Hill saved itself by winning 4 of the 6 second sets after being down 5-4 at the conclusion of the first sets.  
• If the two teams had been playing the 7-Point system I blogged about a few weeks ago then Bel Hill would've been up 2-1 with 4 third set super tiebreakers left to decide the match.

	Nobles	Belmont Hill	Nobles	Bel Hill
1	Will Shames & Anthony Laurencio-Twymer	Carl Reid & Peter Yanofsky	0	1
2	Cam Chapman & Camden Smith	Jack Welch & Bashiru Akinfolrin	0	1
3	Justin Chapman & William Samuels	Nick Tierney & Sam Mcquillan	1	0
1	Cam Chapman	Carl Reid	1	1
2	Anthony Laurencio-Twymer	Peter Yanofsky	1	1
3	Camden Smith	Jack Welch	0	2
4	Will Shames	Nick Tierney	1	1
5	Tarun Gupta	Bashiru Akinfolrin	1	1
6	Will Samuels	Sam Mcquillan	2	0
		Total	7	8

(14) Groton beat (7) BB&N 12-3
BB&N was missing a bunch of starters but this match will drastically alter the power rankings.


(4) Roxbury Latin beat (11) Middlesex 15-0

Brooks beat Lawrence Academy 15-0

St. Mark's beat Thayer 10-5