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Saturday, April 27, 2013

Kiick, Rogers Meet in Charlottesville $50K Final; North Caroline Women, Duke Men Fall in ACC Semis; Brymer Takes Third Straight CIF Title in Ojai

Seventeen-year-old Allie Kiick and 20-year-old Shelby Rogers will meet in the final Sunday of the $50,000 Pro Circuit event in Charlottesville, Va., with the lead in the French Open wild card race on the line.

The unseeded Kiick, ranked 313, has never reached the final of a $50,000 tournament, but she has been playing well this spring, particularly in qualifying at the Sony Open in Miami last month.  Rogers, also unseeded, has been in three finals at the $50,000 level, two of them last year, winning in Yakima, Wash., and losing in Las Vegas, to Lauren Davis.

Kiick beat No. 5 seed Julia Cohen in Friday's quarterfinals, the only seed she will have encountered this week, and today defeated unseeded Madison Brengle 6-4, 6-3. Brengle was suffering from a foot injury late in the match but did not retire.  Rogers' opponent, unseeded Patricia Mayr-Achleitner of Austria, did retire, with Rogers leading 7-6(5) 4-2.  The winner of Sunday's final, which will be streamed at usta.com, will lead in the Har-Tru French Open Wild Card Challenge with one more tournament remaining.

Rogers also has reached the doubles final, with Stanford's Nicole Gibbs.  Gibbs did an interview this week with Tennis Grandstand, and the 20-year-old confirms what has long been assumed--that she will turn pro after the NCAAs, forgoing her senior year.

At the men's $50,000 Savannah Challenger, it will be No. 3 seed Ryan Harrison against unseeded Facundo Arguello of Argentina in the final. Harrison is already in the French Open, so that match will have no impact on the men's French Open wild card race.

Most of the conference tournaments will conclude Sunday, in advance of Tuesday's NCAA Division tournament selection announcement, and not all the finalists are the top two seeds.

The ACC women's final will feature No. 4 seed Miami against No. 7 seed Florida State, after both teams upended higher-ranked teams today by 4-3 scores.  Tenth-ranked Miami beat No. 2 North Carolina, with freshman Kelsey Laurente clinching for the Hurricanes at No. 2, taking a  5-7, 6-3, 6-4 decision over Zoe DeBruycker.  Florida State, ranked No. 30 this week, beat No. 13 Virginia 4-3. After dropping the doubles point, Florida State got singles wins from the bottom four spots in the order, with Amy Sargeant clinching for the Seminoles with a 76(2), 4-6, 7-5 win over Xi Li at No. 4. Florida State had taken out No. 2 seed Clemson in Friday's quarterfinals, so their ranking will get a boost from this tournament. They also beat Miami in Miami during the regular season.

The men's ACC final will feature Virginia for the tenth straight year, but the No. 1 seeds will be facing not usual nemesis Duke, but Wake Forest, after the Demon Deacons upset the Blue Devils 4-3.  Duke, the No. 2 seed and No. 9 in the ITA rankings, led 3-0, but Wake came all the way back, with Amogh Prabhakar winning a third-set tiebreaker from Michael Redlicki at No. 3 to finish it. According to a Wake Forest tweet, Redlicki was given a game penalty for his fourth overrule in the tiebreaker, trailing 5-0.

An interesting twist to Sunday's final involves the two head coaches, with Wake's second-year coach Tony Bresky an assistant to Virginia's Brian Boland from 2003-2010.

The Big Ten did deliver both its top seeds, with the Michigan women and Ohio State men comfortably through, but it is the No. 3 seeds they will face in Sunday's finals.  The Michigan men have reached the conference final for the first time after a 4-3 win over No. 2 seed Minnesota, avenging a 4-3 home loss to the Golden Gophers during the regular season. Michael Zhu clinched at No. 5, taking a 2-6, 7-6(5), 7-5 win over Ruben Weber after trailing 6-2, 4-0.  Michigan's women will face Northwestern, the No. 3 seed, after the Wildcats disposed of No. 2 seed Nebraska 4-1.

In the Big 12, No. 1 seed Baylor will meet No. 2 seed Oklahoma in the men's final. The women's semifinals are still in progress.  The Pac-12 final between the USC and UCLA men is also not complete as of 8 p.m.

For links to all the tournament results, see the ITA's Matchday Central page.


In Ojai today, Easter Bowl champion Gage Brymer won his third consecutive CIF singles title, the first player to accomplish that since Bobby Riggs did it in the 1930s. Brymer defeated Taylor Fritz, who finished third in the 16s Easter Bowl this year, 6-3, 6-0 in the final of the tournament for high school tennis players in Southern California.

In the women's Pac-12 individual tournament it will be two freshmen going for the title on Sunday, with Stanford's Krista Hardebeck against UCLA's Kyle McPhillips.

All the draws for the Ojai can be found at the tournament website.

2 comments:

JD said...

Rogers also reached the final at the 2010 50k at Indian Harbour Beach, the event she turned pro at

Colette Lewis said...

Thanks for the correction. I somehow overlooked that 2010 final, even though I watched it on the stream.