Freshmen, Pre-Qualifiers Earn Spots in ITA All-American Draws as Play Begins Thursday

©Colette Lewis 2012--
Tulsa, OK--

The draws are out for the start of the ITA All-American Championships that begin on Thursday for the women in Pacific Palisades, California and for the men here in Tulsa, Okalahoma.

Pre-qualifying for both men and women began last Saturday, with two players advancing through both that draw and the qualifying draw to earn a spot in tomorrow's opening round at the Michael D. Case Tennis Center on the campus of Tulsa University.  Joe Salisbury of the University of Memphis and Chris Diaz of the Ohio State University both have already won a tournament's worth of matches just to get into the main draw. Diaz, who beat teammate Connor Smith 7-6(3), 6-2 in today's final qualifying round, has seven victories to his credit; Salisbury, who is the first player from Memphis to ever reach the main draw of the All-American tournament, won six, thanks to a bye in the first round of the pre-qualifying.

The women's draws are smaller, but six victories are still required to reach the 32-player main draw for those in pre-qualifying.  Florida's Danielle Collins and Virginia's Julia Elbaba, both blue chip freshmen, won those six matches to advance to the main draw, as did Baylor sophomore Ema Burgic.  Collins and Elbaba are two of the four freshman in the main draw at the Rivieria Tennis Club, with Krista Hardebeck of Stanford, who did not have to play pre-qualifying, winning her three qualifying matches and Whitney Kay of North Carolina receiving a main draw wild card for claiming the ITA Summer Circuit championships back in August.

There are two freshmen in the men's main draw, with Texas A&M's Shane Vinsant and Virginia's Mac Styslinger winning three qualifying matches to get in. Styslinger will be trying to become the third straight Virginia freshman to capture the All-American, although both Alex Domijan and Mitchell Frank were wild cards, not qualifiers.

Kalamazoo champion Dennis Novikov of UCLA, who had received a wild card into the main draw, withdrew with an ankle injury he suffered in the Futures tournament last week in Irvine.

The top seed in the men's draw is Duke Henrique Cunha, with Virginia's Jarmere Jenkins the No. 2 seed.  The top women's seed is Cristina Sanchez-Quintanar of Texas A&M. Zsofi Susanyi of Cal is the No. 2 seed in the women's draw.

The results of all the qualifying and the singles and doubles draws are available at the ITA website.

The men's tournament page is here.  The women's tournament page is here.

The men play two round of singles and a round of doubles on Thursday, so expect a late post on Thursday, although I will be tweeting throughout the day.