What the hell is going on with this years team? We got killed by florida and then lost to miami who was 42 in the nation and our best players got suspended. Could be a tough year for Cass and the boys.

[This message has been edited by aggie11 (edited 2/10/2003 1:54p).]

not worried about the miami loss. our team is far superior, we were just without our top 2. with ryan and lester we woulda won 6-1. only worried about these alleged disciplinary problems...hope they learned a lesson or got things straightened out or whatever, and will be back by saturday.

florida bothers me a little, because they are beatable, and it woulda been great for our ranking to beat the #6. the problem is losing the doubles point, because it kills our momentum. obviously the underclassmen need some more experience, but all the guys from last year still need to step up. i will never second guess cass, but i would just like to figure out a solid dubs lineup. the big question is if lester will play #1 with ryan or ante. him and ante have the big ranking right now, but him and newp were also always tough. when our top pair gets more established, then our 2 and 3 can get more matches together and build the cohesion needed for doubles. i say if lester and ante stick at 1, play matt/john at 2 and ryan/khaled at 3. IMO we could win the dubs point against damn near anyone with that lineup.

however, only time will tell what cass and the boys decide to do. a slow start won't kill us, especially if we turn it around with 2 big wins on saturday. at this point, i'm not too worried.

I think this is the definition of a "rebuilding year". We were really top heavy the last two years and now we're kind of starting over with 2 notable exceptions. Look at the roster and you'll see what I mean. This year could be rough but the talent we have is young and will get much better and more consistent in the 2 - 3 years to follow. Coach Cas has established a solid foundation that he will build on.

I have a hard time considering this a rebuilding year. I know we lost our #2 (From) and #5 (Skube) singles players and another doubles contributer (Bauer), but you would assume that Lester and Ante would improve on their strong freshman years. It appears that losing Derrick has been a big loss for us...he sure would've helped in doubles and probably would've played 5 singles for us.

The main reason for our struggles, in my opinion, has been the loss of players after their freshman year. I mean look back over the past few years....we've lost Nathan Price, Tres Davis, and Derrick Bauer all after only one year in the system. Nathan Price for example is playing #2 singles for Arkansas. This is killing our depth and requiring us to bring in freshman each year and expecting them to contribute heavily...3 fish contributed last year and 3 more are contributing this year.

i also disagree about this being a rebuilding year. our top 3 now is better than our top 3 last year, and we have to give our fish a chance to get some matches under their belts. i'll reserve judgement on anyone's performance until after this weekend, provided that we have the full roster back. see y'all on saturday.

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This is killing our depth and requiring us to bring in freshman each year and expecting them to contribute heavily...3 fish contributed last year and 3 more are contributing this year.

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That's called "rebuilding". You could not have made my point better.

[This message has been edited by Three Run Jack (edited 2/11/2003 8:27p).]

so you're saying last year was a rebuilding year also?

There is no question that the untimely loss of Trey, Nathan, and Derrick has caused some problems. We are strong enough, however, to be competitive and I don't think we have that far to go to a fine team. This team should get better as the season progresses, assuming we avoid the injury bug.

Three Run Jack,

The reason I don't consider this year to be a rebuilding year is that I expected us to be better than last year. I figured the improvement of Lester and Ante in their 2nd years would outway the youth we had to add to our lineup this year. Obviously we have been "rebuilding" since the 2001 season when we had our best team ever, but players graduate and leave and they get replaced by freshman...that's the nature of college tennis.