Wimbledon Wild Cards Announced; Gibbs and Jenkins Lead USTA Collegiate Team; Spinosa and McCray Win National Hard Court Titles

Wimbledon announced the first of its wild cards today, although in keeping with recent practice, they've retained two women's and four men's wild cards so they don't overlook anyone who has an outstanding grass court season, which is just beginning. Junior Kyle Edmund and 2010 Northwestern graduate Samantha Murray are among those receiving main draw wild cards for the first time.  Murray's WTA ranking is now 240, and Wimbledon has said in the past that those ranked inside the top 250 of either tour will be considered for main draw wild cards. At 444, Edmund is outside that number, but at 18, he is considered the top prospect among British teens, and his close loss to Slovenia's Grega Zemlja in the first round at the ATP event in Queens this week, where he competed as a wild card, also may have helped his case.

The men's main draw wild cards:

Nicolas Mahut (France)
Kyle Edmund (Great Britain)
Matthew Ebden (Australia)
James Ward (Great Britain)
4 To Be Announced

The women's main draw wild cards:

Elena Baltacha (Great Britain)

Anne Keothavong (Great Britain)

Johanna Konta (Great Britain)

Tara Moore (Great Britain)

Samantha Murray (Great Britain)

Andrea Petkovic (Germany)

2 To Be Announced

Men's qualifying wild cards:

Jamie Baker (GBR)

Alex Bogdanovic (GBR)

Ed Corrie (GBR)

Dan Evans (GBR)

Josh Goodall (GBR)

Filip Peliwo (CAN)

Joshua Ward Hibbert

WC playoff

WC playoff 

Women's qualifying wild cards:

Naomi Broady (GBR)

Amanda Carrerass (GBR)

Lisa Whybourn (GBR)

WC playoff

WC playoff

3 additional TBA

I am surprised the USTA's method--most points won over the current grass challengers taking place now--hasn't been used to determine one of the wild cards. I think it beats any of the alternatives.

The USTA's Collegiate team, like the Wimbledon wild card slate, is not yet complete, but today the USTA released the names of those who have already made the team, including Nicole Gibbs and Jarmere Jenkins, as well as those who are still vying for a spot during the upcoming camps.  I'll have much more on the revamped team on Friday, when my interview with Dustin Taylor, the USTA's new National Coach for Collegiate Tennis, is published at the Tennis Recruiting Network.

The USTA National Open Hard Court Championships, a USTA gold-ball event, took place last week in San Diego, with current University of San Diego standout Clarke Spinosa winning the men's singles title and future Oklahoma State Cowgirl Megan McCray taking the women's singles titles, after finishing with bronze and silver balls the previous two years. For more on the tournament, see this article on usta.com, and for complete results, see the TennisLink site.