NCAA D-I Roundtable Part II; Women's First Round Action Sees Four 17-32 Teams Ousted; Day, Bellis, Dolehide Advance to Naples $25K Semifinals; Qualifying Draws Out for Grade A in Milan

Part II of the Tennis Recruiting Network's NCAA Division I roundtable was published today, with the panel picking their champions, dark horses and the unseeded teams they think might advance to the Sweet 16 in Tulsa.  Part I, published on Monday, is here.  I make very few predictions, mostly because I'm not good at it, but this is my yearly exception.

The women's regionals first round is complete, no top 16 seeds out, but with four teams in the 17-32 grouping losing to teams in the 33-48 grouping.

A short-handed Kansas team lost to UC-Santa Barbara 4-3, with Santa Barbara reaching the second round for the first time in program history. Wake Forest fell to Baylor 4-2, Clemson lost to Rice 4-1, and Wichita State was beaten by TCU 4-3.

The results for all the women's first round matches are available by going to the NCAA draw.

Just seven of the 16 men's regionals got underway today, but the 33-48 group still managed to beat teams in the 17-32 group in two cases.
Sweet 16 host Tulsa will not have its men's team to help with attendance as they were beaten by Oregon 4-1. As with UCSB, the Ducks posted the first NCAA win in program history today.  Rice lost to LSU 4-3, with the match being decided in a third-set tiebreaker at line 5.

The results from today's men's matches are available via the NCAA draw.

The US juniors at the $25,000 Women's Pro Circuit event in Naples, Florida, again turned in another impressive batch of results in Friday's quarterfinals.  Seventeen-year-old CiCi Bellis, the No. 4 seed, beat No. 6 seed Olga Ianchuk of Ukraine 6-2, 6-0 in just over an hour to advance to a meeting with 16-year-old Kayla Day, who beat No. 2 seed Michelle Larcher de Brito 7-5, 7-5.

Seventeen-year-old Caroline Dolehide defeated No. 8 seed Sonya Kenin 7-6(6), 6-4 to reach her first pro circuit semifinal above the $10,000 level.  She will play fellow wild card Valeria Solovyeva of Russia, who beat top seed Susanne Celik of Sweden 6-4, 6-2.

At the Grade 1 in Santa Croce, Italy, JJ Wolf lost in the semifinals to wild card Jacopo Berrettini of Italy 6-4, 6-4. The only break in the first set came with Wolf serving at 4-5. In the second, the No. 3 seed went up a break to lead 3-2, but did not consolidate and was again broken as he served to stay in the match at 4-5.  Berrettini will play No. 4 seed Alexei Popyrin of Australia in the final.  The girls final will see No. 6 seed Emily Appleton of Great Britain against No. 16 seed Eva Guerrero Alvarez of Spain.

Brandon Holt and Vasil Kirkov, the No. 5 seeds, won the all-US boys doubles final, beating Patrick Kypson and Oliver Crawford 6-3, 6-1 in the final.

The girls doubles title went to No. 8 seeds Amina Anshba of Russia and Nika Shytkouskaya of Belarus, who beat No. 7 seed Tatiana Pieri and Lucrezia Stefanini of Italy 6-1, 0-6, 10-4.

Order of play, draws and live streaming is available at the tournament website.

The qualifying draws for next week's Grade A in Milan are out, with seven boys--Trent Bryde, Brian Cernoch, Alexandre Rotsaert, Alafia Ayeni, Oliver Crawford, Patrick Kypson and Gianni Ross--hoping to earn a place in the main draw.  Three US girls are in the qualifying draw: Melissa Plambeck, Chiara Lommer and Nicole Pafundi.