February Aces; Easter Bowl Gets New Sponsor, Main Site; Goldstein, Jones, Solomon Among Those Inducted into Men's ITA College Hall of Fame
My monthly post at the Tennis Recruiting Network, which looks back on the top junior, collegiate and young professional accomplishments in February, is now available for viewing. In addition to the extremely exciting ITA Team Indoor Championships, I've also spotlighted teens who have made strides on the ATP and WTA tours, as well as those who have picked up titles on the ITF Pro Circuit.
After six years at the Rancho Las Palmas resort in Rancho Mirage, California, the 2013 Easter Bowl, now title-sponsored by Asics, will be moving to the Sunrise Country Club, also in Rancho Mirage. The ITF Grade B1 Closed tournament will be played at the new site, with many, but not all, of the sites previously used for the 14s and 16s divisions also utilized again this year during the first several days of the tournament. Because of the surging popularity of the nearby Coachella music festival, which begins on the tournament's second weekend, hotel rooms are scarce, so please see the Easter Bowl website for the names of the area hotels that have rooms set aside for the tournament until March 5.
Bryan Hamilton Fineberg, the son of Seena Hamilton, has contracted with Palm Springs area tennis professional Lornie Kuhle to direct the tournament this year, which could be the last year the event serves as a gold ball USTA event for the 14s and 16s, depending on the decision of the USTA Junior Competition and Sportsmanship committee. Martha Gregg, referee of the ITF International Grass Courts in Philadelphia, who also chairs many ITA and NCAA matches, will serve as the tournament referee. Entries for the 14s and 16s close on March 14th. See the TennisLink site for more details.
The deadline for the ITF Grade B1, which must be made through the ITF junior website, is Tuesday, March 12th.
The Intercollegiate Tennis Association today announced the newest members of the Men's College Hall of Fame, who will be inducted at the NCAAs in Champaign, Illinois in May.
The players:
Paul Goldstein, Stanford
Kelly Jones, Pepperdine
Harold Solomon, Rice
The coaches:
Dennis Emery, Kentucky
Bobby Bayliss, Notre Dame
John Peterson, Tyler Junior College
Contributor:
Alan Schwartz, former president of USTA, Yale
Paul Goldstein, whose name came up frequently last year, when USC's Steve Johnson and Daniel Nguyen were striving to match his four consecutive NCAA team championships, was one of the most popular players in the history of the USTA Nationals in Kalamazoo. Goldstein, who won the 16s in 1992 and the 18s in 1993 and 1994, came back for the tournament's exhibition several times, most recently in 2009. That year, I interviewed him for the Tennis Recruiting Network, with the complete question and answer session available here (recruiting advantage membership required for the entire article). I believe he is the only one of the seven inductees not still involved in tennis.
The complete release from the ITA is here.
4 comments:
Colette,
I was wondering if you were going to make any mention of Rebecca Marino's decision to retire from the tour due to depression. Although it is a very private matter it does raise issues that anyone involved in the game should be aware of and should be talking about. Rebecca said she'd been struggling with depression for around six years even while she was making it into the top 40. She also made a few comments about the pitfalls of social media that would be worth a young player hearing. Often times the players are pushed into being on-line (Twitter, Facebook, etc) by agents and others because they feel that making them more visible and more approachable will make them more marketable.
I was worried Jack Sock's main draw wildcard streak was broken at Indian Wells BUT thankfully his qualifying wildcard was upgraded to main draw.
HIs wins this year - 109, 14, 114
HIs losses this year - 170, 166, 59, 47, 87
This is a good Challenger level resume
He is 3-5 this year. Does this warrant another main draw wildcard? Has anyone not learned that giving wildcard after wildcard to the "chosen one" does not help his/her development - only gives them false sense of security and a gross case of entitlement. Shouldn't his coach, agent, usta step in and do what is best for him?
So exactly who would you give the WC to ? Jack stared out the season with an ankel injury in Australia because he turned down the opportunity to compete for the md wc, and choose to try to qualify instead. Since then he has been playing very good, occasionally great, tennis. He's a couple wins a way from getting direct notary to must of these events anyhow, then you will have nothing to complain about....
Jack deserves it
Why would you reward someone OR hurt someone with so many wildcards because there may be no one else to give it too?
Certainly not teaching him that hard work pays off when you keep receiving entry into tournaments you cannot get into with your own merit. Jack is 0-2 this year in qualifying - in fact has not won a qualifying match.
At least Rhyne Williams won a 100K in Dallas and qualified into Memphis, beat WC Steve Johnson and lost in 3 sets to Top 20 player. That merits a consideration.
Jack has a huge upside and deserves some help but I am only mentioning it because this is really getting out-of-hand.
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