Special from
Division3Tennis.com
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Hello tennis fans, and welcome to our 2015-2016 D-III Freshmen To Watch article! My handle is D3Northeast, and here today to help me are a couple of writers from our women's side, D3NortheastWomens and D3WestWomens. As you will see, we've tried to narrow our focus by region. Although there hasn't been a lot of match play yet (for most regions, only the ITAs have been significant matches), we used the results we do have combined with the TennisRecruiting.net 2015 college commitments list to determine our freshmen to watch. We have also listed each player's UTR courtesy of UniversalTennis.com. We have listed at least three "freshmen to watch" from each region of the country, the new players that we writers at Division3Tennis.com will be keeping our eyes on come springtime. Thanks to TRN for having us back again this year, and here's to another great season of D-III tennis!
Atlantic South Region - Men's
Jonathan Jemison (Emory) 12.98 - Jonathan made the finals of Emory's regional ITA, where he lost to his teammate, consummate gamer, and current No. 2 player in the nation, Rafe Mosetick. Jemison just made the semifinals of a separate tournament at Georgia Gwinett that was full of good NAIA and D-II players. With Emory hit hard by graduation, expect Jonathan to play in the top half of Emory's lineup from the start. Jemison is part of the No. 4 recruiting class in D-III, so expect Emory to be a young but talented team in 2016.
Daniel Levine (
Carnegie Mellon)
12.00 - Daniel beat Michael Holt (
Washington & Lee) and Jeremy Dubin (
Johns Hopkins) at his ITA regional, en route to the semifinals. Levine also paired with teammate Yuvraj Kumar in the doubles draw, and the duo made it all the way to the tournament finals. Daniel played in the No. 2 spot, ahead of established CMU players like Kiril Kirkov and Kunal Wadwani, in Carnegie's team match vs.
Oberlin. Levine won that singles match in straight sets, putting a stamp on his excellent fall season.
Jack Gray (Sewanee) 11.66 - Jack paired with Sewanee senior Eric Roddy to win the doubles draw at the Atlantic South ITA Regional, and the duo qualified for Small College Nationals in Palmetto, South Carolina. At Small College Nationals, Gray and Roddy pulled off a couple more upsets, including defeating the No. 3 seeded team from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, on their way to the National Finals. National rankings are not released until the 29th, but Gray and Roddy should head into the spring as the No. 2 doubles team in the country.
Atlantic South Region - Women's
Taylor Cosme and Daniela Lopez (Emory) 9.66 and 8.43 - Emory, which landed the No. 4 ranked recruiting class, got a very strong performance from their freshman Taylor Cosme in their regional ITAs. She won the regional and went on to place third in the ITA Small College Nationals, making her the highest-placing freshman in the draw (the other freshman was the above mentioned Kim). Classmate and teammate Lopez made it to the quarterfinals of the regional where she fell to teammate Satterfield. With these freshmen, Emory will boost the top of their lineup, giving them a great outlook going into the spring season.
Taylor Cosme (left) defeated
Emory teammate Bridget Harding (right) to win the USTA/ITA South Regional
courtesy,
Emory Athletics Jamie Vizelman (
Carnegie Mellon)
8.62 - Vizelman from CMU made it to the round of 16 at ITA's before falling to Chen of
Hopkins, not a bad result for the first-year who appears to be taking over the No. 2 lineup spot this season per CMU's results against
Oberlin.
Teressa Hill (Washington & Lee) 6.49 - Tessa Hill from W&L fell to her teammate and No. 2 seed Donnelly in the regional quarters and then paired with Donnelly to reach the doubles semis, before falling to eventual champs Pavia/Sidell of CMU.