2/3 Review: Interesting Stuff

Interesting History
We have only had two other seasons where we've had as successful a start to the year as we've have this season. Those were in 2008 and in 2010. Let's do some comparison for fun, shall we?

Records after this weekend
2008: 10-4
2010: 11-1
2013: 9-2

As you can see, we've played less matches this season at this point than in others. That's because we used to be in a couple of varsity tournaments early in August. The season that we won the Sectional, we had already lost 4 matches. In 2010, which is the season we ended with the best record, we'd only lost once. This year comes in the middle. But what about the quality of those records?

Records against teams with winning records
2008: 3-4
2010: 3-1
2013: 3-2

Same number of wins in each of these seasons over teams with winning records. However, you can see that our schedule was strongest in 2008. This year we've had a decently strong schedule as well. Just a little under half of our matches have been against teams with winning records. Looking deeper into the win-loss record against teams with winning records...

Records against district ranked teams
2008: 1-4
2010: 0-1
2013: 0-1

So we can see how strong that 2008 schedule was. All 4 losses we had that season were against teams that were district ranked. No wonder that team was battle tested come the Sectional! What about close matches?

Records in 3-2 matches
2008: 1-3
2010: 1-1
2013: 2-2

So this year's team is the only one of the team's to pull out 2 "3-2"wins. We've also played under a decent amount of pressure. Which is good. Because Sectional will be under pressure :-) So what about Sectional?

Record against Sectional Opponents
2008: 3-0
2010: 3-0
2013: 3-0

Now, only in 2008 did we end up winning the Sectional. In 2010, we suffered a loss to Fairfield before the Sectional and also in the Sectional Semi-Final. So, how did these seasons end up?

Final records
2008: 15-5
2010: 18-3
2013: ? ? ?

In 2008, we didn't lose again in the regular season after this weekend of the season. We went on to win the Wayne Invitational (over Wabash, Wayne, and Elmhurst), defeat Penn (ranked 4th in the district) and win the Sectional. Our final loss of the year came to East Noble in the Regional.

In 2010, we lost to Fairfield. At tournaments, we got rained out of a very promising start at the Merrillville Invitational. We had defeated state-ranked Valparaiso's #2 doubles and advanced in 4 of 5 positions. We won the Wabash Invitational the next weekend. Then we got knocked out of the Sectional by Fairfield. Only 2 teams beat us all season, district ranked Columbia City and Sectional Champion Fairfield.

Where does 2013 go from here? Well, we've got 2 tournaments left to compete in. We've also got some challenging opponents. Marian, Blackhawk and Elkhart Central this week. Fairfield and Bremen next week. A couple more teams with winning records (Marian and Fairfield) and a couple more at the Wabash Tourney (Wabash and Taylor). We'll also have to keep getting better during practice. That's certainly what the 2008 team excelled at. As the season went on, they got better. They owed a lot of that to competition from their JV. See more on the JV below, but one more comparison before we go...

Season's after Matt's children are born...
1. Season after Gideon was born (12-14-07) --> 2008 Season --> 15-5, Wayne Champs, Sectional Champs

2. Season after Judah was born (6-12-10) --> 2010 Season --> 18-3, Wabash Champs

3. Season after Hosea was born (10-5-12) --> 2013 Season --> ? ? ?

I'm not saying, but I'm just saying :-)

Outstanding JV Start of the Season
Another awesome feature of 2008 was how good the JV was. While the upperclassmen were winning a Sectional, the JV was going undefeated. The backbone of that JV were the players who made up the 18-3 2010 varsity.

This year's JV team has 1 loss, but that one loss came without their top player (Byeong Min Lim) and they've since avenged that loss, as it was to NorthWood and Friday night we defeated NorthWood as a JV. Can't say we're undefeated, but we're doing pretty well. Looking down the road, it's interesting to start thinking about which one of these players will make up the next great Bruin varsity team. Look at some of the gaudy JV records as well (Ethan Lapp: 11-1, Bryce Miller: 10-1, Simon Hurst: 10-2, Byeong Min Lim: 9-1). The list goes on. The talent of the JV team is unlimited, if they match their talent with their work.

Interesting Stats
- Joel and Hans 9 straight match wins to start the season ties for the 9th longest winning streak in Bethany history.

- Sol Brenneman has won 6 straight matches. He's starting to find a rhythm as well. For the JV, the longest current winning streak is Ethan Lapp, who's won 10 straight.

- Several varsity players will have a chance of setting a record for most wins in first varsity season, or at least move up the list of leaders. Most likely is Sol and Landon.

- Speaking of first varsity seasons, as a freshman Jesse Amstutz won 4 varsity matches. He's already got 7 wins this season!

- Other big improvers? Parth Patel (from 6 --> 8), Landon (from 6 JV wins --> 8 varsity wins), Ryan Duckworth (0 wins because of injury --> 9 this season), Ethan Lapp (8 --> 11), Jack Erlacher (4 --> 7) and Paul Krabill (1 --> 3)!

- Sol Brenneman has a JV record of most wins in a season (13), Ethan Lapp is only 2 matches behind tying that record and Bryce Miller and Simon Hurst just one behind him.

- Abe Thorne has played 4 matches so far against players who will fight for All-District status. They make up 4 of his 6 losses.

- The most matches ever won by a Bethany #1 doubles team is 15. Joel and Hans have 9. They'll certainly have a chance to get to 15 in the next couple of weeks, if they are up for the challenge.

- Next week will be the busiest week of our schedule, as both varsity and JV players will have chances to play 6 matches in 6 days. This is because both teams travel to tournaments (that they've never won) on Saturday, September 21. Go for trophies!

Team Records
Varsity: 9-2
Junior Varsity: 11-1-2

Position by Position
#1S: 4-7
#2S: 9-2
#3S: 8-3
#1D: 10-1
#2D: 9-2

#1SJV: 13-0
#2SJV: 8-5
#3SJV: 7-3
#4SJV: 1-3
#5SJV: 0-2
#6SJV: 1-1
#7SJV: 1-0

#1DJV: 9-3
#2DJV: 10-2
#3DJV: 6-2
#4DJV: 3-4
#5DJV: 2-2
#6DJV: 1-1
#7DJV: 1-0

Person by Person
Seniors
Joel Gerig: 9-1
Parth Patel: 8-2
Abe Thorne: 3-6
Justin Zehr: 7-4

Juniors
Jesse Amstutz: 7-2
Neel Bhagat: 6-4
Sol Brenneman: 3-3
Ryan Duckworth: 9-2
Hans Miller: 9-1
Roberto Ramos: 3-3
Jacob Rudy-Froese: 1-5
Landon Weldy: 8-2

Sophomores
Jack Erlacher: 7-2
Paul Krabill: 3-0
Ethan Lapp: 11-1

Freshman
Jacob Gonsalves: 2-2
Simon Hurst: 10-2
Jackson King: 4-3
Byeong Min Lim: 9-1
Bryce Miller: 10-1
Lane Miller: 8-4
Brandon Nguyen: 5-4
Matthew Peters: 4-4
Daniel Robles: 3-2