What is the state tournament like in your state?

[MRfStop]

Georgia state tournament has the reputation of there always being teams that have players that are well into the next NTRP level. This is pretty much at every NTRP level I have played but probably more dominant in the 4.0 level. Teams having players that are well above their rating. There are only a few cities that have teams that are stacked like that. Usually it's Atlanta, but sometimes there is an Athens team or Columbus. Macon never really takes a team that has much chance to win. We have scratched and clawed our way to some wins but never done anything significant. The last 3.5 state team I was on we were playing for a spot in the semis but our singles lost making the team match 2-3. This past state my team went 9-0. Some of the team in the league have a spread of decent players but we showed up to state and only won 4 out of 15 matches.

What is your state championship like? Are all the teams pretty even? Or is there a huge gap (like Georgia) between the teams that have a chance to move onto Sectionals and those who are just there

 

[schmke]

First, you are showing Southern section bias by referring to a State tournament . Some sections are not organized by state, instead there are areas or districts that are not state aligned that advance to Sectionals. But in Southern a State is a District so we'll assume you are asking about district level playoffs.

In my experience, you will see a mix of teams at Districts and some will have players that are going to be bumped up at year-end. That is more or less to be expected as the teams that make Districts are the best teams from their local areas/flights and are often put together to make a run in playoffs so have stronger players to begin with, and then especially at lower levels but still even at 4.0, players who are making a run at playoffs often practice and get lessons and improve which pushes them into the range to be bumped up.

Now, there is a different between "some" and "nearly all" players on a roster being this high. I would say it is not common to have the majority of a roster this high, but it certainly does happen as you can see from the Nationals previews I recently posted on my blog. At some levels, all or nearly all of the teams that are top-40 in the nation have top-8 averages at or over the top of the range for the level. Now, these are just the top-40 teams across the country, and assuming an even distribution across the sections that would be just 2-3 teams. But the distribution is not even, and Georgia does tend to have more than their allotment that are rated very high.

Now, there is a bit of a reason for this. Yes, as much as I dislike seeing it happen, sandbagging does happen and it contributes to players "improving". But in addition to that, Georgia has early start leagues and teams that just played Georgia States (or are finishing up today) may have started league play around a year ago, and players on these teams that are bumped up can continue to play on their team. So you may have a 3.5 team that started play in May 2017 and had 6 of 15 players bumped up to 4.0 at 2017 year-end. Per Southern/Georgia rules, these players are eligible to continue playing as 3.5s on this team through Sectionals. In situations like this, you can see why Georgia States has such strong teams and Georgia shows up high on my top-40 lists.

Now, these bumped up players will not be eligible for Nationals, so teams from other sections thinking they'll have no shot at Nationals, fear not, you won't see those Georgia teams, at least not their entire roster, in all likelihood at Nationals as some players will not be eligible if it is an early start team with bumped up players.

 

[J_R_B]

My district playoffs is going to be between 4 teams that have all gone to nationals in the last 5 years. So, there's that.

 

[MRfStop]

My district playoffs is going to be between 4 teams that have all gone to nationals in the last 5 years. So, there's that.

Is there a tournament between Districts and Nationals? or is it just district then nationals?

 

[J_R_B]

Is there a tournament between Districts and Nationals? or is it just district then nationals?

Sectionals.

 

[winchestervatennis]

Ive played districts/state in VA, MD, and SC in 4.0 and 4.5. Each time it seemed like there was a few stacked teams (not necessarily out of level players) that were really deep and the rest of the teams didn't have much of a shot... unless they got really favorable matchups.

SC state is this weekend, can't wait!

 

[J011yroger]

Seems cyclical here, some years very strong some years meh.

J

 

[RLtennis]

In my state there is usually one team that is pretty dominant for 4.0. At 4.5 however, people can barely scrape up teams so it's not really fair to say that the one team is dominant. Considering the fact that they're the only team truly made up of 4.5's (and a few sandbaggers)

 

[OrangePower]

in Norcal we have Districts and then Sectionals.
Usually 4 or 5 separate Districts tournaments with 16-20 teams in total participating, all held on the same weekend but each tournament at a different venue. This is out of 120+ teams (depending on level) in the regular season, so just making it to Districts is a good achievement.
Then the determination of which areas play in which Districts grouping is different each year, I'm assuming done by random draw or similar. So if a team advances out of local area playoffs there is some luck of the draw involved in terms of how strong a grouping it lands in for Districts. On the plus side it means you get so see different teams and people if you are lucky enough to make Districts on a regular basis.
Winner of each Districts grouping advance to the Sectionals tournament.
Teams who win Districts and make it to Sectionals typically have at least 4 players who should be at the next level and will likely be bumped up. Some have more.