Nakashima Defeats Top Seed Monteiro, Six Americans Advance to Orlando Challenger Quarterfinals; Finals Set at ITF Grade 5 in San Diego; More Men's Division I Signings

Two Americans were guaranteed to reach the quarterfinals after today's second round matches at the ATP Challenger 80 in Orlando, with two all-US contests on the schedule, but the results were even better, with the other two Americans taking on international players also advancing, giving the US six of the eight quarterfinalists.

Brandon Nakashima, the former Virginia Cavalier, defeated top seed Thiago Monteiro of Brazil 6-4, 6-3 on a very windy day at the USTA National Campus in Lake Nona. It's the 19-year-old from San Diego's fifth Top 100 win, all coming this year. On Friday, Nakashima will face No. 8 seed Mackenzie McDonald(UCLA) after the 2016 NCAA singles champion defeated Elias Ymer of Sweden 6-3, 6-3.

The other top half quarterfinal will feature Mitchell Krueger and Alexander Ritschard(Virginia). Krueger won the only three-set singles match of the day, defeating Bjorn Fratangelo 3-6, 6-2, 6-2. Ritschard, a qualifier, advanced to the third Challenger quarterfinal of his career with a 6-3, 6-4 win over lucky loser Nick Chappell(TCU).

There's one more all-US quarterfinal in the bottom half, with Christopher Eubanks(Georgia Tech) and No. 2 seed Denis Kudla, who had the day off today, playing for a spot in the semifinals. The fourth quarterfinal features No. 7 seed Dmitry Popko of Kazakhstan and No. 4 seed Prajnesh Gunneswaran of India.  

Free live streaming of the matches is available here.

The finals are now set at the ITF Junior Circuit Grade 5 in San Diego. No. 7 seed Kimmi Hance and No. 5 seed Vivian Ovrootsky will play for the girls title after straight-sets wins today. Hance defeated No. 2 seed Jennifer Riester 6-1, 6-0 and Ovrootsky beat No. 6 seed Calissa Dellabarca 6-1, 6-1.  The boys final features No. 2 seed Lucas Brown, who defeated unseeded Wil Jenkins of Great Britain 6-1, 6-3, and unseeded Sebastian Sec, who beat qualifier Zane Ford 6-7(4), 7-6(2), 6-3. Sec has now won three consecutive matches from a set down.

The National Letter of Intent early signing announcements continue, and I'm splitting the men and the women in the next two days. Below are the most recent men's signings.

Zach Foster, Australia's Enzo Aguiard and Slovenia's Filip Planinsek have signed with Alabama. 

Murphy Cassone and Italy's Nicola Cigna have signed with Arizona State.

Kento Yamada has transferred to Central Florida after two years at Kentucky.

Matthew Pitts and Maxwell Smith have signed with Clemson.

Nate Bonetto and Jordan's Abedallah Shelbayh have signed with Florida.

Alex Bulte of Australia has signed with Florida State.

Josh Portnoy and Max Sheldon have signed with Michigan State.

Christopher Li of Peru has signed with North Carolina.

Milledge Cossu has signed with Purdue.

Will Davies has transferred from Iowa to San Diego.