Top US women in the WTA

[bronze_ribbons]

During some recent discussions about sexism in tennis, I realized that I need to spend more time learning about women players and the Women's Tennis Association in general. I have been more impressed by the younger US women than the younger US men (both in performance and comportment) over the past year, but I frankly don't hear as much about them, and I know far less about them.

I just tested myself: I recognize the names of all the US men in the top 250, but the woman ranked #117 -- Maria Sanchez -- is not known to me. Considering that tennis has been my main fandom the past three or four years (to the extent that I've planned vacations around tournaments), that is not OK.

I haven't budgeted for travel to any tournaments in the near future, but when I eventually fit one in (perhaps with a press pass? that's on my "maybe someday" list...), it will be to a women's or combined event. In the meantime, there's plenty of homework to do, and I'll be posting my notes here. Starting with this list of US tennis players in the Top 700 (aka the top 59 US players). The number in front of each name is the player's current ranking, and the names in bold are those of players whose matches or practices I've attended.


2 Williams, Serena
17 Stephens, Sloane
21 Lepchenko, Varvara
23 Williams, Venus
42 Mchale, Christina
62 Hampton, Jamie
81 Keys, Madison
85 Oudin, Melanie
91 Davis, Lauren
99 Vandeweghe, Coco
104 King, Vania
117 Sanchez, Maria
120 Glatch, Alexa
122 Cohen, Julia
142 Falconi, Irina
145 Burdette, Mallory
150 Pegula, Jessica
170 Scholl, Chiara
180 Mattek-Sands, Bethanie
187 Min, Grace
198 Riske, Alison
201 Gibbs, Nicole
206 Craybas, Jill
212 Brengle, Madison
216 Rogers, Shelby
266 Crawford, Samantha
285 Hsu, Chieh-Yu
305 Hardebeck, Krista
308 Elie, Jennifer
344 Brodsky, Gail
350 Weinhold, Ashley
359 Boserup, Julia
375 Vickery, Sachia
390 Kiick, Alexandra
417 Will, Allie
432 Melichar, Nicole
437 Muhammed, Asia
455 Ferris, Elizabeth
456 Luzhanska, Tetiana
467 Litvak, Lena
475 Abaza, Jan
478 Mueller, Alexandra
504 Lumpkin, Elizabeth
515 Duval, Victoria
527 Stevenson, Alexandra
531 Gullickson, Chelsey
533 Marand, Sanaz
541 Austin, Brooke
553 Whoriskey, Caitlin
559 Cako, Jacqueline
562 Ahn, Kristie
580 Pluskota, Natalie
605 Embree, Lauren
613 King, Alexis
631 Kinard, Tori
641 Albanese, Lauren
652 Spears, Abigail
686 Schnack, Yasmin
700 Loeb, Jamie

I compiled this using the WTA Singles Rankings tables. (You can sort by country by clicking the "Country" header.)

My next steps may include:

learning more about the North American tournaments those ranked above 200 can be seen at, both in person (especially in the SE US) and via laptop (I seem to recall live streaming from Stanford last year?)

learning more about the players in general. The folks who maintain the Wikipedia pages on tennis players are impressively organized, and the WTA player pages are a good supplement (when I can get the search feature to cooperate). I also really like Matchstat for reviewing H2Hs and results by surface. And, of course, there are also links to various articles and blogs languishing in my bookmark stashes...