2024 18+ Male Intermountain Sectionals

[TennisOTM]

The event is this week Friday and Saturday, held in Utah. Discuss!

Here's a quick rundown:

3.0: Utah, Nevada, and Colorado contending. Nevada won last year. This year Utah seems to have the deepest roster of strong contenders: 15 guys, every single one rated between 2.90 and 3.25 on TR

3.5: Utah, Nevada, Colorado, and Idaho contending. Utah won last year. This year looks pretty even on paper, according to TR. All four teams have a small handful of likely-soon-to-be-4.0s. Guessing this one will be close.

4.0: Utah, Nevada, Colorado, and Idaho. This is high-interest event with the former multi-time national champ captain back for Utah with a new team. Seems to me, based on TR, that his opponents look stronger than usual this year. Lots of depth on all teams with many high-end 4.0 players, including Idaho which does not usually have a very deep roster. The Utah team has several S- or A-rated players - will they need to rely on them to get wins and risk DQ? Should be interesting as always.

4.5: Strangely this is the only level where Wyoming and Montana are sending teams - do only very good players play league there?? So this is by far the largest men's event with all 6 Intermountain teams. Utah won last year, but that team is long gone after bump ups and the captain moving back to 4.0. Colorado looks like the deepest team this year.

5.0: Utah, Nevada, Colorado, and Idaho. This is the first Utah men's 5.0 team in many years - they have a player who went to Nationals the last two years in 4.0 and then 4.5 - can he make it three years in a row at three different levels? Will be a tall order - defending champs Colorado look very strong.

 

[TennisOTM]

Matches start tomorrow morning! Weather will be hot in the afternoon, though not as bad as recently - should stay below triple digits. Anyone on here participating?

 

[the_faceless_player]

I’m not down there this year as we couldn’t get over the hump and repeat again at 5.0 but all my friends from my old 4.5 team are there for Idaho

 

[m_rights]

My team didn't qualify though I'll probably try to go watch some matches. Hoping for a similar amount of entertainment as last year where someone apparently tried to throw a match in an attempt to get their opponent DQed.

5.0: Utah, Nevada, Colorado, and Idaho. This is the first Utah men's 5.0 team in many years -

I'm surprised Utah didn't have a men's 5.0 team previously as this year they had enough players to have a league (2 teams battling it out the whole season). IIRC it came down to the wire as the season matches were pretty evenly split.

 

[TennisOTM]

Some early match results are in! Here's what I'm seeing so far:


3.0: Utah squeaked by Nevada 3-2 in the early match. It's only a three-team playoff (with Colorado) and all teams will play each other twice.

3.5: Nothing posted yet

4.0: Utah took down Nevada 4-1 with a few big wins from S- and A- rated players against very strong opponents (according to TR). Could we possibly see a DQ? Colorado beat a good Idaho team 4-1.

4.5: Looks like it could be a nailbiter - all three of the first matches among the 6 teams went 3-2. Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming got the wins.

5.0: Likely favorites Colorado smoked Idaho - looks like Idaho only has a 4-man team as they defaulted the singles line. Nevada beat Utah 2-1 with two very close doubles match wins.

 

[TennisOTM]

I'm surprised Utah didn't have a men's 5.0 team previously as this year they had enough players to have a league (2 teams battling it out the whole season). IIRC it came down to the wire as the season matches were pretty evenly split.

Yeah looked like a nice competitive league even though it was just two teams. Kinda unusual that they went with the 2S/3D format for their season, and now for the playoffs they have to play 1S/2D.

 

[the_faceless_player]

Yeah looked like a nice competitive league even though it was just two teams. Kinda unusual that they went with the 2S/3D format for their season, and now for the playoffs they have to play 1S/2D.

Probably did that to ensure everybody on their rosters could get enough matches in / just get more play in. Their teams look pretty big on paper. I had always heard there was some sort of long standing disagreement with the USTA office and a lot of Utah 5.0 players and that was why they weren't playing in Sectionals in years past but I don't know what it was or how true it was.

I knew my friends from Idaho's 5.0 team were only going to be going down with 5 guys at best and it looks like that didn't even happen. Interested to see how CO vs. NV shakes out this year since CO's roster is a bit different this year after having to split up.

Idaho's 4.5 team is down a key singles player who got injured during districts but otherwise brought their best team so maybe they can get over the hump. We never seem to adjust to the elevation well and singles has gotten us in years past when I was a 4.5.

 

[TennisOTM]

Idaho's 4.5 team is down a key singles player who got injured during districts but otherwise brought their best team so maybe they can get over the hump. We never seem to adjust to the elevation well and singles has gotten us in years past when I was a 4.5.

I was just looking at the 4.5 Idaho 3-2 win over a very good Colorado team. Looks like it was a crazy one. Idaho's win at 1S was 7-6, 0-6, 1-0, and their win at 2D was 6-7, 7-6, 1-0.

 

[Purestriker]

Some early match results are in! Here's what I'm seeing so far:


3.0: Utah squeaked by Nevada 3-2 in the early match. It's only a three-team playoff (with Colorado) and all teams will play each other twice.

3.5: Nothing posted yet

4.0: Utah took down Nevada 4-1 with a few big wins from S- and A- rated players against very strong opponents (according to TR). Could we possibly see a DQ? Colorado beat a good Idaho team 4-1.

4.5: Looks like it could be a nailbiter - all three of the first matches among the 6 teams went 3-2. Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming got the wins.

5.0: Likely favorites Colorado smoked Idaho - looks like Idaho only has a 4-man team as they defaulted the singles line. Nevada beat Utah 2-1 with two very close doubles match wins.

UTAH dominates, shocking!

 

[the_faceless_player]

I was just looking at the 4.5 Idaho 3-2 win over a very good Colorado team. Looks like it was a crazy one. Idaho's win at 1S was 7-6, 0-6, 1-0, and their win at 2D was 6-7, 7-6, 1-0.

Saw that. Singles guy is new to their team this year and I don't really know him. That dubs pair can very streaky either direction so that kind of scoreline is less surprising to see.

 

[TennisOTM]

3.5: First results are in, Utah 5-0 over Idaho and Nevada 3-2 over Colorado.

Colorado has an S-rated singles player who got a 6-0, 6-0 win over a high-end 3.5 opponent in their team loss to Nevada. Looks like he got four pretty dominant singles wins in Districts as well. Almost seems like he is daring USTA to DQ him. Will it happen??

 

[TennisOTM]

4.0: Another easy win for Utah, 5-0 over Idaho. Slight possibility for DQ strikes to S- and A-rates (different guys than the first match). Now Utah only has to play Colorado tomorrow, who lost to Nevada. Looks like Colorado would have to beat Utah by at least 4-1 and maybe even 5-0 to get the tiebreak to advance to Nationals, so Utah can maybe take it easy in that one.

4.5: This is a great playoff - all of the 6 team matches played have been 3-2. Utah and Idaho lead with 2-0 records, but each of them are below 50% on total games won so have maybe had some luck. Still seems like anyone could take it with a good run in the final 3 matches of the 6-team round robin.

5.0: Colorado beat Nevada and is the only 2-0 team. Utah is 1-1 after beating short-handed Idaho and has a shot at Colorado tomorrow.

 

[schmke]

4.0, Utah's first match was largely as expected, 1S slightly easier than expected and same for 3D.

Second match, very minor upset on 2S (and it was a match TB), the others largely as expected.

 

[TennisOTM]

Wow the Utah men went undefeated on Day 1 at 3.0, 3.5, 4.0, and 4.5. Outside chance at a full sweep if the 5.0 team can upset Colorado today.

 

[TennisOTM]

3.0 Utah lost a match on day 2 but finished 1st in the standings, and they are through to Nationals.

3.5 Utah beat everyone and are going to Nationals. Colorado had a couple of dominant singles players but the doubles lines didn't get it done.

4.0 Much-discussed Utah team completed the sweep against Colorado 5-0. Looks like another strong national champ contender. Strong S- and A-rated portion of squad appear to be through with no DQs.

4.5 Utah is leading with a 4-0 record. Wyoming is second at 3-1 and has a chance to take it from Utah if they can best them tomorrow and win the standings tie break.

5.0 Not Utah! Colorado beat them today to finish undefeated.

 

[NumbersGuy]

oops wrong thread

 

[TennisOTM]

To complete the story, Utah 4.5 men completed their sweep on Sunday, beating Wyoming. Intermountain will be represented by Utah at 3.0, 3.5, 4.0, and 4.5, and Colorado at 5.0. Congrats to all the winners.

 

[Creighton]

I'm surprised Utah didn't have a men's 5.0 team previously as this year they had enough players to have a league (2 teams battling it out the whole season). IIRC it came down to the wire as the season matches were pretty evenly split.

All their best 5.0s has been busy at 4.0.

 

[TennisOTM]

To complete the story, Utah 4.5 men completed their sweep on Sunday, beating Wyoming. Intermountain will be represented by Utah at 3.0, 3.5, 4.0, and 4.5, and Colorado at 5.0. Congrats to all the winners.

Checking in on how these Intermountain teams are doing at Nationals.

3.0 men from Utah finished dead last. Looks like they had a couple of tight 3-2 losses but then got swept by the two teams who ended up making the finals (Southern and NorCal), so it was a tough draw for them.

4.0 men from Utah went undefeated in round robin and made the finals, but lost 3-2 to Southern. Looks like Utah struggled with singles toward the end, going 0-6 in their last 6 singles matches, but they still almost pulled it out - just needed one last doubles win but came up short.

5.0 men from Colorado are national champs! They pulled out two 2-1 nailbiters against NorCal in the semis and Southern in the finals. In both of those matches, the last doubles line lost the first set and then won a tiebreak second set plus the match tiebreak.

Interesting that the 5.0 women's champ was also from Colorado! Is Denver a hotbet of 5.0 league tennis?