Falconi Qualifies at Wimbledon Despite Rain; Maureen Connolly Challenge Underway; Florida Closed Winners; All-Americans Announced

Irina Falconi won her final Wimbledon qualifying match today, one of only four women who were able to secure their spots in the main draw between rain showers. With her 6-3, 6-2 victory over Junri Namigata of Japan, Falconi has now qualified for all four Grand Slams since she left Georgia Tech a year ago. She has gone a perfect 9-0 in qualifying at the US Open, Australian Open and Wimbledon, and won the USTA's wild card tournament to earn her place in the French Open. She has yet to win a main draw match in a slam, but she was very impressive in qualifying this week, dropping only 12 games in three matches, so maybe Wimbledon will be the site of her first win. She is again blogging for usta.com, which she's been doing pretty much non-stop the past six weeks, and according to this WTA "Getting to Know" feature (which I missed while I was busy at the NCAAs) we know why she's agreed to write so much. "I'm a big writer...I love to write."

The remaining qualifying matches will be played on Friday. Lindsay Lee-Waters lost, and Alexa Glatch did not start her match. Ryan Harrison will need to come from two sets down (men's final qualifying matches are best of 5) if he is to qualify. Cedrik-Marcel Stebe of Germany came back from 4-1 down in the second set against Harrison to take a 6-3, 7-5 lead.

The draw is set to take place at 10 a.m. (5 a.m. Eastern) and can be followed at wimbledon.com.

The second annual Maureen Connolly Challenge Trophy competition is underway in Eastbourne with girls 18-and-under teams from US and Great Britain facing off. The US team consists of Vicky Duval, Krista Hardebeck, Madison Keys, Grace Min and Christina Makarova, while Great Britain's team is Daneika Borthwick, Lucy Brown, Katy Dunne and Fran Stephenson. The US won three out of the four singles matches today and split the two doubles matches. For more on today's play, see the LTA website. In another exhibition tournament prior to Wimbledon, this one in Liverpool, LSU's Neal Skupski surprised 45th-ranked Andrey Golubev 6-4, 6-3. Neal is the younger brother of Ken Skupski, an All-American at LSU, who is now playing doubles on the ATP tour.

Neal Skupski was officially pronounced an All-American himself today, with the ITA releasing the list for 2011. The complete list is here. Below are the players who were All-American in both singles and doubles.

MEN:
Reid Carleton (Duke)
Austen Childs (Louisville)
Henrique Cunha (Duke)
Bradley Klahn (Stanford)
Austin Krajicek (Texas A&M)
Alexandre Lacroix (Florida)
Michael Shabaz (Virginia)
JP Smith (Tennessee)

WOMEN:
Mari Andersson (Cal)
Hilary Barte (Stanford)
Josipa Bek (Clemson)
Venise Chan (Washington)
Denise Dy (Washington)
Bianca Eichkorn (Miami)
Chelsey Gullickson (Georgia)
Jana Juricova (Cal)
Denise Muresan (Michigan)
Maria Sanchez (USC)
Allie Will (Florida)


The Florida Closed wrapped up today, with the following results in the finals:

18s:
Brett Clark(2) def. Zack McCourt(1) 6-4, 7-6(6)
Danielle Collins(1) def. Chalena Scholl(2) 6-1, 6-1

16s:
Ognjen Samardzic(3) def. Tommy Mylnikov(4) 6-4, 6-7(6), 6-4
Katerina Stewart(4) def. Caroline Dailey(3) 6-4, 6-0

14s:
Chase Colton(3) def. Reilly Opelka(2) 4-6, 6-1, 6-2
Madison Bourguignon(4) def. Madison Harrison(7) 6-1, 6-2

12s:
Noah Makarome(1) def. Vasil Kirkov(3) 6-2, 6-2
Jaeda Daniel(2) def. Nicole Conard(1) 6-3, 7-5

10s:
Harry Cacciatore(3) def. Matthew Fung(4) 6-2, 6-1
Amanda Anisimova(2) def. Zoe Hitt(1) 6-2, 6-3

For the complete draws in the 14s, 16s, and 18s see the TennisLink site.
For all the 10s, and 12s results, see this TennisLink site.