Pro Circuit Notes; Q & A with Michael Shabaz; Nina Pantic Reports on UCLA
The Pro Circuit events this week include the $10,000 Men's tournament in Costa Mesa, Calif. and the $75,000 women's tournament in Albuquerque, NM. There is also a $50,000 women's event in Canada that has drawn quite a few notable juniors. US Open girls champion Heather Watson qualified and in her first round match yesterday took No. 2 seed Valerie Tetreault of Canada to three sets before falling 5-7, 7-6(5), 7-5. Christina McHale returned to action there for the first time since her U.S. Open loss to Maria Sharapova, and today she beat No. 8 seed Rebecca Marino of Canada 4-6, 7-5, 6-3. THe 18-year-old Marino, who had committed to Georgia Tech before deciding to turn pro instead last year, is now ranked 169. For more on the today's matches, see the Tennis Canada website.
In Albuquerque, former Clemson star Ani Mijacika, who I heard has turned pro, qualified and has reached the second round with a straight set win over wild card Brittany Augustine. Top 10 junior Ajla Tomljanovic also qualified, defeating NCAA champion Mallory Cecil in the final qualifying round, then posted a first round win, taking out No. 4 seed Anna Tatishvili, another Evert Academy student. Noppawan Lertcheewakarn of Thailand used her junior exemption into the field and advanced to the second round with a win over Argentina's Agustina Lepore.
There were/are several juniors in the Costa Mesa draw, No. 4 seed Yong-Kyu Lim of Korea, Nikoloz Basilashvili of Georgia, Mousheg Hovhannisyan and Americans Ryan Harrison and Jordon Cox. Cox received a special exemption into the main draw when he reached the quarterfinals last week in Claremont. Among the current and recent former college players are qualifiers Olivier Sajous, Holden Seguso, Robbye Poole, Erling Tveit and Tyler Hochwalt, as well as Michael Venus and Blake Strode. Lester Cook, now 259 in the ATP rankings, must have been a late entry, as he went through qualifying, although he is the top seed.
For complete draws, see the Pro Circuit results page.
The women move on to Las Vegas next week, and an email from Ryan Wolfington of USTA Nevada about the event mentioned that junior players Krista Hardebeck and Nicole Melichar won wild card tournaments for spots in the qualifying and former ASU No.1 Sabrina Capannolo was given the third qualifying wild card. Asia Muhammad has received a main draw wild card.
In college news, the University of Virginia's website has an interesting Q & A with Cavalier junior Michael Shabaz in advance of this weekend's UVA Ranked Plus One tournament, which will feature more than 30 nationally ranked players. Shabaz, who won the NCAA doubles title with Dom Inglot in May, is expected to play primarily with freshman Jarmere Jenkins this year.
And UCLA's Nina Pantic provides a look at the preparations the Bruins are making for the fall season, as well as how several of them experienced this year's U.S. Open from the inside.
10 comments:
I don't understand this Costa Mesa Pro Circuit draw. It makes no sense in many ways. First of all, it appears that both Raymond Sarmiento and Gary Sacks won their 3 matches in the qualifier but they don't show up in the main draw.
Conversely, Sarkisian loses first round in the qualifier but shows up in the main draw.
Finally, you point out that Lester Cook is the number 1 Seed in the main draw but for some reason also had to play the qualifier.
Can someone please explain all these contradictions?
Can someone please confirm what I heard which is that Nikoloz Blashivali (sp?) has turned pro?
Sarmiento and Sacks made it to the finals but Sarmiento lost to Poole and Sacks lost to Tveit. They ran out of horizontal room so it is very hard to read.
Sarkisian appears to be a wildcard not a qualifier. I tried to find his name in the qualifying bracket but gave up before I went blind.
It does appear Cook had to qualify but is a no. 1 seed. I can't explain that.
Adobe Reader is designed to display the manual for your washing machine, not a bracket for a sporting event.
C'mon guys, Adobe reader has a zoom in/out functions and panning as well. It's not that hard...
If you miss the entry deadline, then you have to play the qualies regardless of your ranking. This must have happened to Cook. The sigin for Q is the evening before it starts. Once he got through the qualies, he was seeded according to his present ranking
Adobe Reader works wonderful for viewing 1910 census forms. There are much better solutions for a fluid tournament bracket.
Can someone really tell me why is Coco Vandeweghe getting all those wild cards. She just received a main draw wild card into Alburqueque now she gets another main draw wild card into Las Vegas. Why is the USTA giving her all these main draw wild cards when she is not winning. What about all the other Americans that are applying for wild cards. Is it because of her family/uncle background, because definitely she is not winning matches. How many main draw wild cards have she received this year? She doesn't even have a great game?
J,
She won the US Open juniors last year. And she does have a great game I think, serves big, moves alright for her size and has a good head on her shoulders. let her develop because she was a late developer in the juniors
Also, she won a round in the WTA event in LA. I believe there is around a 4 or 5 wc maximum for the age 17 though. And she is turning 18 pretty soon, so I guess she's using them up. It's not like the USTA is feeding her wildcards, everyone (no exceptions) at the age of 17 is allotted 4 or 5 (I can't remember which) main draw wild cards.
From WTA site - she does get a lot of WC's and in past 12 months, not much results. Time to stop talking and show results or spread out the WC's a little. Why couldn't she play through qualifying??
WTA
She made her WTA debut in the 2007 Acura Classic as a wildcard. She lost to Elena Bovina 3-6, 5-7 in the first round.[2] She also lost in the first rounds in tournaments in: Miami, to Sabine Lisicki and in Los Angeles to Marta Domachowska. In the 2008 US Open, where she won the girls' singles title, she received a wildcard for the women's singles main draw. She lost to Jelena Jankovic 3-6, 1-6 in the first round.[2]
In 2009, she was granted a wildcard into the 2009 Sony Ericsson Open. she lost to Nuria Llagostera Vives 0-6, 3-6 in the first round. In her second WTA tournament of the year in Los Angeles, she recorded her first WTA-level win[citation needed]. She defeated Tathiana Garbin 6-4, 6-4.
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