My US Open Junior Championships Recap; The Athletic Reviews Junior Slam Results in The Next Generation Series; US Books Place in Davis Cup Quarterfinals, Sweeping Slovakia

If you weren't able to follow the daily coverage of last week's US Open Junior Championships, which went in depth on many of the notable matches of the top ITF juniors, my review of the finals and how the finalists got there, is up today at the Tennis Recruiting Network. I always enjoy the luxury of having a few days to think about the event and how the champions progressed, and also have time to do some research regarding the historic firsts that so often are part of the story at every junior slam, with the global reach of the sport continuing to expand.

When I linked to The Athletic's Darwin Blanch-focused article Wednesday, I didn't realize that it was part of their "The Next Generation" series, which features separate articles on men's and women's prospects, as well as a profile of Learner Tien. Today's article is on the likelihood that junior slam champions will go on to win a major as adults, and a look at each of the eight junior slam champions this year.

The United States fell short of qualifying for the Davis Cup Final Eight of Davis Cup last year, losing to Finland and the Netherlands at this same group stage last year. This year, playing without the top five Americans in the ATP rankings, the team won its first two matches and has already clinched a spot in quarterfinals, with one match remaining. After defeating Chile in three third-set tiebreakers earlier this week, Mackenzie McDonald(UCLA) and Brandon Nakashima(Virginia) clinched Friday's tie with Slovakia with straight set victories. 

The final match of the group stage will be with Germany, which has also clinched a quarterfinal appearance in Spain in late November. There will be something on the line however, with the winner earning a higher seed.

USA 3 Slovakia 0

Mackenzie McDonald (USA) d. Lukas Klein (SVK), 6-4, 6-3

Brandon Nakashima (USA) d. Jozef Kovalik (SVK), 6-3, 6-3

Austin Krajicek/Rajeev Ram (USA) d. Klein/Norbert Gombos (SVK), 6-7(4), 7-6(4) [10-1]

From the USTA release:

September 13, 2024 – The U.S. Davis Cup Team advanced to the Final 8 stage of the Davis Cup Finals and will compete for the Davis Cup title in Malaga, Spain, November 19-24, after defeating Slovakia, 3-0, in the second of three Group Stage ties in Zhuhai, China.

The U.S. win means it and Germany will advance to the Final 8 out of Group C. The Americans play their final Group C tie against Germany on Saturday at 2 a.m. ET, with seeding implications for Malaga on the line. Tennis Channel will carry coverage in the U.S., and lineups will be set one hour before match time.

This year will now also see both the U.S. Davis Cup and Billie Jean King Cup teams competing in their respective Finals alongside one another, with both Finals scheduled to be played in Malaga at the same venue in consecutive weeks. The Billie Jean King Cup Finals, for which the U.S. has qualified, will be played November 13-20.

The Davis Cup article on Friday's match with Slovakia, with quotes from Nakashima and McDonald, can be found here.

Bigun Reaches First ATP Challenger Quarterfinal, Tien Faces Tomic for Spot in Semifinals; ITA Preaseason No. 1s Baris and Zheng Top Fields in Berkeley and Athens as D-I Fall Season Begins

Kaylan Bigun, the Roland Garros boys champion who made the quarterfinals of the other three junior slams this year, received a wild card into this week's ATP Challenger 75 in Las Vegas. Bigun will receive eight entries into Challengers next year via the ATP Accelerator program as a junior slam champion, but for the remainder of this year he will need wild cards, with his ATP ranking barely inside the Top 1000 when this week's tournament began.

The 18-year-old left-hander defeated Govind Nanda(UCLA) 6-4, 6-4 Tuesday for his second main draw victory at an ATP Challenger; today he beat qualifier Patrick Maloney(Michigan) 6-3, 6-4. Bigun had eight aces and faced only two break points in the match, one in each set, and never lost serve.

The break point Bigun saved in the second set came when he was serving for the match at 5-4, after breaking Maloney with a clean forehand winner on his third opportunity in the game. After a couple of forehand errors had Bigun facing a 5-4, 30-40 score, Maloney had his chance, but netted a backhand. After an overhead winner gave Bigun a match point, he didn't make his first serve, but the second was deep to Maloney's backhand and his return went just beyond the baseline.

Bigun, who said at the US Open that his plan was to join UCLA in January, will face his second former Bruin in four days Friday: Karue Sell. The 30-year-old from Brazil saved five match points in his 3-6, 6-1, 7-6(11) win over No. 8 seed Juan Pablo Ficovich of Argentina to reach his fourth Challenger quarterfinal of the year.

On Thursday, No. 3 seed Learner Tien(USC) defeated former Ohio State All-American Cannon Kingsley 6-3, 6-3 and will face No. 7 seed Bernard Tomic of Australia in the quarterfinals.  The two-time Kalamazoo champion has now reached six Challenger quarterfinals this year.  Tomic, 31, beat 22-year-old Eliot Spizzirri(Texas) 7-5, 6-7(3), 6-4 late last night.

The other seeds in the bottom half also advanced to the quarterfinals, with No. 5 seed Abdullah Shelbayh(Florida) of Jordan facing No. 2 seed Denis Kudla.

No. 6 seed Tristan Boyer(Stanford) reached the quarterfinals with a 7-6(5), 6-2 victory over wild card Colton Smith(Arizona) today.

Boyer's opponent will be the winner of tonight's match between Andres Martin(Georgia Tech) and qualifier Quinn Vandecasteele(Oregon).

While former college players are in pursuit of a Challenger title in Las Vegas, the top two Division I men in the preseason rankings are in action in fall collegiate events.

No. 1 Ozan Baris is the top seed at the Battle in the Bay in Berkeley, and has won his first round match. No. 2 seed Karlis Ozolins of Illinois did not, falling to UC Santa Barbara's Dominque Rolland 6-4, 6-2. Another UC Santa Barbara Gaucho, senior Gianluca Brunkow, beat No. 3 seed Pedro Vives of TCU 7-6(2), 7-5, and No. 13 on the Newcomers preseason ranking, Zoran Ludoski of Arizona, defeated Kenta Miyoshi of Illinois, a No. 5 seed, 6-4, 6-3.  Kalamazoo 18s champion Matthew Forbes lost to No. 4 seed Lui Maxted of TCU 6-2, 6-1.

The women's field in Berkeley is topped by Angie Oby Karjuru of Oklahoma State, No. 5 in the preseason rankings, with NCAA singles finalist Anastasiia Lopata the No. 2 seed. Although the day's first round women's action is not complete, Marcela Lopez of Oklahoma State did post an upset, beating No. 3 seed Amelia Honer of UC-Santa Barbara 6-3, 1-6, 7-6(6).

Preseason No. 2 Michael Zheng of Columbia, the 2024 NCAA singles finalist, is the No. 1 seed in the Red Flight of the Southern Intercollegiates in Athens Georgia. There are only two seeds in the 16-player flight, with Georgia's Thomas Paulsell the other. The Southern Intercollegiates, in its 56th year, will begin with doubles early Friday and concludes on Sunday.  See the tournament central page at georgiadogs.com for streaming and live score and results links.

Brennan Takes Over Stanford Women's Head Coaching Position; USA Beats Chile in Davis Cup; Features on Former Illini Michael Kosta and Juniors Robertson, Stojsavljevic and Blanch

Stanford made an announcement today that many people thought would come immediately, when legendary women's head coach Lele Forood revealed on August 20 that she would be retiring. No one expected that anyone other than Forood's longtime assistant/associate head coach Frankie Brennan would succeed her, and today the school made that official, removing the interim tag they had placed on him last month.

Brennan's life has revolved around the program since his father Frank was head coach, prior to Forood's hiring, and he spent 29 years on the staff between the two of them.  I had an opportunity to chat with Forood briefly at the US Open, as she watched Stanford freshman's Valerie Glozman's third round match, and she assured me that she is not "retiring" in the usual connotations of the word. She intends to stay in the Bay Area and work on bringing more tournaments to Northern California; I sensed her dismay at the current state of college athletics, including the demise of the Pac-12, may have accelerated her retirement timeline.

Brennan no doubt understands the challenges of Stanford's upcoming move to the ACC, and of taking over the most successful program in NCAA women's sports from a renowned leader who won 10 NCAA championships as a head coach and five as an assistant coach in her career. But there is no one who knows the culture and the history of the program better, which should ease the transition considerably.

Davis Cup is back for the World Group after qualifying in February, and the United States is in China competing in their group against Germany, Slovakia and Chile. The top five US men are not playing, with ATP No. 40 Brandon Nakashima(UVA), in his Davis Cup debut, the highest ranked American competing this week, along with Reilly Opelka, Mackenzie McDonald(UCLA), Austin Krajicek(Texas A&M) and Rajeev Ram(Illinois).

The US team defeated Chile 3-0, with all three matches coming down to third set tiebreakers:

Reilly Opelka (USA) d. Cristian Garin (CHI), 6-3, 4-6, 7-6(3)
Brandon Nakashima (USA) d. Alejandro Tabilo, 7-6(5), 2-6, 7-6(3)
Austin Krajicek/Rajeev Ram (USA) d. Tomas Barrios Vera/Matias Soto (CHI), 4-6, 6-4, 7-6(3)

In the wee hours of Friday morning, the US will face Slovakia, and then Germany. The top two finishers in each of the four groups competing this week will advance to the quarterfinals in Spain at the end of November.

Now that I'm home, I've had a little time to catch up on my tennis reading, and I've seen four stories that might be of interest to those who follow college and junior tennis.

Michael Kosta, the former University of Illinois player and University of Michigan assistant coach, changed careers in 2006, pursuing standup comedy as a profession. (I wrote about this unlikely transition for Tennis Recruiting Network, subscription required). Now a regular on the Daily Show, Kosta is the subject of this feature in GQ Magazine.

When British juniors excel, media attention follows, and here are two features on US Open girls champion Mika Stojsavljevic and US Open boys semifinalist Charlie Robertson. Although the Robertson article doesn't mention it, Robertson has been taking visits to the top Division I schools and drew a lot of attention from coaches at both College Park and New York.

And The Athletic's Matthew Futterman dives into what it means to be a much hyped tennis prodigy in this article, focusing on Darwin Blanch, who turns 17 later this month, but is no longer playing junior tennis (Kalamazoo being the lone exception in 2024).

Georgia Tech Graduate Martin Beats Top Seed Kypson, Bigun Wins Opener at Las Vegas Challenger; Maya Joint Turns Down $146K to Join Texas

It's been three weeks since there has been any action on the USTA Pro Circuit due to the US Open, and the women are still without a tournament, sending many of those seeking competition in North America to this week's W35 in the Dominican Republic.

The men have an ATP Challenger 75 in Las Vegas this week, with qualifying concluding on Monday, with six former collegians, all from the United States, advancing to the main draw: Collin Altamirano(Virginia), Omni Kumar(Duke), Quinn Vandecasteele(Oregon), Patrick Maloney(Michigan), Trey Hilderbrand(UCF, Texas A&M) and Alex Rybakov(TCU). With the six US qualifiers, a total of 22 Americans are competing in the 32-player draw.

Vandecasteele is the only qualifier to win his first round match so far, defeating Luke Saville of Australia 6-2, 7-5, but Altamirano, Kumar and Maloney have yet to play, with their matches tonight.  

Rybakov gave No. 3 seed Learner Tien(USC) a battle in their first round match today, but the two-time Kalamazoo champion won the two-hour 41-minute contest 6-7(6), 6-2, 6-2.

Two of the three wild cards have advanced to the second round, with Arizona senior Colton Smith beating Christian Langmo(Miami) 6-1, 6-3 and ITF junior No. 2 Kaylan Bigun, who is scheduled to begin at UCLA in January, beating former Bruin Govind Nanda 6-4, 6-4. Ohio State graduate JJ Tracy, the third wild card recipient, lost to former teammate Cannon Kingsley 5-7, 7-6(0), 6-3.

Bigun served for the match at 5-3 in the second set, but had all sorts of trouble with his serve, making only one first serve, double faulting twice and ending the game with an unforced error.

Nanda couldn't take advantage of that gift however, missing a forehand wide at 30-all, and failing to come up with a volley at the net on match point. Roland Garros champion Bigun, who lost in the US Open junior quarterfinals on Thursday to eventual champion Rafael Jodar of Spain after leading 5-3 in the third, will face the winner of the late match between Maloney and No. 4 seed Brandon Holt(USC).

It's the second main draw Challenger win for Bigun, who also advanced to the second round of April's Sarasota Challenger as a qualifier.

Recent Georgia Tech graduate Andres Martin won his second ATP Challenger main draw match of the year today, and it was a big one, with the 23-year-old from Georgia taking out top seed Patrick Kypson(Texas A&M) 6-3, 1-6, 6-1. Martin will play Vandecasteele in the second round.

With Sunday the deadline for declaring whether they would accept the prize money from their performance at the US Open, quite a few juniors had a difficult decision to make. Iva Jovic, who is only 16 and has not committed to attend college, would not reveal the direction she was leaning, but as she has yet to enroll, Jovic can claim all her expenses and as much as $10,000 for the year, if she has not already done so. The WTA site has her current earnings for 2024 at more than $170,000. 

Fifteen-year-old Julieta Pareja, who reached the final round of women's qualifying as a wild card, won $58,000, yet with college tennis three years away, is probably not making a decision that would rule out that option for her, as her stellar results have come primarily in the last several months. Whether the NCAA will still have the power to deny her or any of the juniors who have earned substantial prize money at the US Open their earnings, next year, let alone in three years is certainly debatable.

Matthew Forbes, the Kalamazoo champion, will leave his $100,000 with the USTA, and as he was already enrolled at Michigan State, he does not get the $10,000 that juniors are allowed, and could only claim expenses.

Maya Joint is in a similar position, as the WTA No. 111 had already enrolled at Texas, and had until two days ago to decide whether to take the $146,657 she received for qualifying and winning a round in the main draw. The injunction hearing in the Reese Brantmeier case, which asked for a ruling on whether the NCAA could continue to prohibit student-athletes from collecting prize money and still retain their eligibility, was on August 15. Almost a month later, the judge has not made a determination on granting the injunction.

The USTA told me that they were not getting in between the NCAA and the courts, and that their rules of accepting the prize money by the final day of the tournament would continue to be enforced, regardless of the pending legal case.

This article today from the Washington Post (available to everyone via this gift link) provides all the relevant details on Joint's decision to relinquish the prize money in order to play for Texas. If you read the comments on the article, you will notice many people, most of them not versed in college tennis compliance, I'm sure, suggest the USTA hold the money in a trust and make it available when the player declares herself a professional, but that is not something the USTA has ever pursued, despite the outcry last year when Fiona Crawley of North Carolina raised the issue and the obvious movement of the NCAA toward student-athlete compensation via the introduction of Name, Image and Likeness income.

This is not a new issue, although the obvious disparity between quarterbacks or point guards and non-revenue athletes is a twist that wasn't present in 2012, when Mallory Burdette of Stanford faced a similar choice.

I wrote about Burdette's decision to turn pro after reaching the third round of the US Open after her junior year at Stanford in this article for the Tennis Recruiting Network. She was required to declare her amateur status before the tournament began, but was not prohibited from taking the $65,000 she had earned when she changed her mind:

"You just check a box at the beginning of the tournament that says you are playing as an amateur," Burdette said. "But I went in and I talked to the tournament referee Brian Earley and he walked me through the process. He basically said it's not a problem if you want to take the money. You obviously realize you're giving up your scholarship and your last year of NCAA eligibility, but the money's there and it's yours if you would like to take it."

I don't think that declaration is still required anywhere on the Pro Circuit, in a nod to the $10,000 allowance introduced for junior players, but obviously the impetus to find a means for distributing the money to the players who have earned it but want to play college tennis does not exist at the levels of the USTA or the US Open where change could be made.

I'm old enough to remember when the push to allow professionals at the Olympics was seen as armageddon, but the Olympics have certainly not suffered, and have indeed been enhanced, by the top stars like Steph Curry and Novak Djokovic competing in them. 

This may all be settled within the next year, before the 2025 US Open, but all the prospective and current student-athletes who competed in this year's event deserve better.

As a side note, I've recently had problems with the template on this site, and the "post a comment" option has disappeared. I am trying to investigate the pros and cons of a newer template, but in the meantime, you can still comment by clicking on the "Comments" link on the bottom of each post. Just make sure you use some sort of name, not the anonymous option.

Link to USTA National 16s and 18s Highlight Show Featured on Tennis Channel; Roversi Goes Back-to-Back on ITF Junior Circuit; Emerson Jones Rises to Top Spot in ITF Junior Rankings; World Junior Tennis Tour Finals Qualification Rankings

The highlight show of the USTA 16s and 18s National Championships last month in San Diego debuted Saturday on Tennis Channel, and is now available to everyone at this link: Breaking Barriers 2024.  There is also a two-minute recap of the Boys 18s final in Kalamazoo at the 40-minute mark.  The highlight show can be accessed throughout the year by clicking on the Southern California Tennis Association Foundation banner on the left of the zootennis.com home page.

With the US Open Junior Championships taking all of my attention last two weeks, I wasn't able to follow the other result on the ITF Junior Circuit until today, but there were four singles titles claimed by three American girls the past two weekends.  Unseeded 14-year-old Janae Preston, the 2023 USTA 14s Clay Court Champion, won her first ITF Junior Circuit title at the J30 in Panama. Preston defeated, the No. 2 and No. 4 seeds to reach the final, where she beat No. 5 seed Maria Suarez of Colombia 6-1, 6-0. Suarez was one of four Preston opponents to lose a set 6-0.

At the J30 in Honduras, 15-year-old Adelie Osher won her second ITF Junior Circuit singles title, with the No. 1 seed defeating No. 6 seed Ashvini Tara Gopalan of Canada 2-6, 6-4, 6-3 in the final.

Sixteen-year-old Floridian Marcella Roversi won her first two ITF Junior Circuit titles at the J30 in Trinidad and Tobago two weeks ago; as the No. 4 seed in singles and unseeded in doubles. Roversi lost only seven games in her three victories, beating Mildalyn D'aguilar of the United States 6-4, 6-1 in the final and partnering with Shiloh Walker of Trinidad and Tobago in the doubles.

She then played the J60 in Colombia last week and took the singles title there as a qualifier. After winning two qualifying matches, Roversi advanced to the final by beating Americans Gabriella Kellner[2] and Isabella Pisarczyk in the quarterfinals and semifinals. She defeated No. 3 seed Daniela Chica of the United States 7-5, 6-3 in the championship match, her seventh straight-sets victory of the week.

Donald Stoot of the United States, seeded seventh, reached the boys singles final, retiring in the third set against wild card Pablo Robledo Hoyos of Colombia.

The post-US Open junior rankings were published today by the ITF, with a new No. 1 in Australia's Emerson Jones.  Jones would be the first to admit that her last two tournaments have been disappointing, with a second round loss in College Park and a third round loss in New York, but the 52-week rolling system isn't meant to track current momentum, just overall points earned. When Wimbledon girls champion Renata Jamrichova did not defend her 2023 semifinal points at the US Open, and Jones added points after losing in the first round in 2023, Jones took over the top spot.  

Iva Jovic has moved up to No. 2, her career high, with Tyra Grant remaining at No. 4. USO girls finalist Wakana Sonobe of Japan is up to No. 6, her career high, and champion Mika Stojsavljevic of Great Britain jumped 25 spots to No. 8.

Annika Penickova, who made the USO quarterfinals, moved from 91 to 48.

The top 3 boys remained the same, with Nicolai Budkov Kjaer of Norway, Kaylan Bigun of the United States and Rei Sakamoto of Japan maintaining their positions. US Open champion Rafael Jodar of Spain moved to No. 4, with Great Britain's Charlie Robertson, a US Open semifinalist, entering the Top 10 for the first time.

The US Open Junior Championships mark the end of the race for the World Junior Tennis Tour Finals, which will be held in Chengdu China October 14-20.  

Here are the top eight boys and girls in the final qualification rankings, but the likelihood that they all play is small. I asked several of the top boys about their participation and the only one who enthusiastically said he would be accepting his invitation was Maxim Mrva of the Czech Republic.

Boys:

1. Nicolai Budkov Kjaer, Norway
2. Kaylan Bigun, United States

3. Rei Sakamoto, Japan

4. Rafael Jodar, Spain

5. Mees Rottgering, Netherlands

6. Maxim Mrva, Czech Republic

7. Luca Preda, Romania

8. Joel Schwaerzler, Austria

Girls:

1. Emerson Jones, Australia

2. Iva Jovic, United States

3. Renata Jamrichova, Slovakia

4. Tyra Grant, United States

5. Laura Samson, Czech Republic

6. Wakana Sonobe, Japan

7. Teodora Kostovic, Serbia

8. Mika Stojsavljevic, Great Britain

There are no Chinese players in the Top 25 currently, so no spot in the finals is available to the home country in either the boys or girls competition.

Michigan State's Ozan Baris Assists Fritz in Run to US Open Men's Final

Prior to Saturday's junior finals, I went out to courts 13, 14, 15 and 16 at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center after USTA National Coach Troy Hahn had informed me a few days prior that there was an event scheduled for a dozen American juniors, which Mitch Hassenbein had organized in honor of his son Drew. The Hassenbeins have established the Drew Hassenbein Foundation to support tennis players in the New York area, as a way to continue the legacy of their son, who was killed in a tragic automobile accident in May of 2023.  The drills and competitions gave the boys an opportunity to be on the grounds to watch junior matches and play on the courts used by the pros; they were also scheduled to spend Sunday at Columbia's new tennis center, with additional juniors from the USTA's Eastern section, where Drew played, participating in that event.

When I saw 2024 Boys 14s Nationals finalist Tabb Tuck hitting with Michigan State junior and 2024 NCAA semifinalist Ozan Baris, I knew there must be a story there, and indeed there was. Baris has been serving as a hitting partner throughout the tournament for US Open men's finalist Taylor Fritz.

"I originally was asked to be a hitting partner a couple of months ago, some one from the team reached out to me," said Baris, who hit with Fritz early in the first week, and has continued in that role for the duration of the tournament, allowing him to also help out with the Hassenbein junior event.  "There's other guys--Liam Krall(recent SMU grad) has been hitting with (Jannik) Sinner every day. Mark Krupkin, Andrew Ena (blue chip juniors in the area), they're hitting with whoever needs it."

Baris said he did have one hitting session with Fritz in Ashe, but most of the practices have been on the courts behind the 4, 5 and 6 bank of match courts.

"Honestly, I came and I knew I would hit with some good players," said Baris, who is taking all his fall semester classes at MSU online. "But I came in with no expectations, just try to have a good time. I'm in New York and not playing a tournament, which is probably the only time that will happen for the rest of my tennis-playing life. I get to enjoy it, get to watch some tennis, it's fun."

Baris wasn't sure how long he would be in New York initially, but with Fritz continuing to advance, he now isn't scheduled to go home until Monday.  "The earliest I would have left is probably today, but now I'm staying. My body's hurting. I'll put it this way, I'm here for Fritz, I'm not here for myself anymore. I don't think I ever really was, but now I'm really not. I'm just here to get him the title."

Baris couldn't quite give Fritz that final boost, with the first American man to reach a major championship in singles since 2009 falling to top seed Sinner 6-3, 6-4, 7-5.

Now Baris will turn his attention back to his own game, with preparations for the first NCAA individual championship in November less than three months away.

"I'll play Battle in the Bay next week, hopefully (ITA) All-Americans and NCAAs," said Baris, ranked No. 1 in the ITA preseason rankings. "I will play whatever I need to to get into NCAAs."