Fruhvirtova and Pinnington Jones Win Grade 2 Titles in Dominican Republic; Khan and Nava Reach $15K Finals; No. 2 Baylor Men, No. 6 Duke Women Upset; More WTA Doubles Titles for Collegians

The top seeds both prevailed today at the ITF Grade 2 tournament in the Dominican Republic, with 15-year-old Linda Fruhvirtova and 17-year-old Jack Pinnington Jones taking the titles in straight sets.

Fruhvirtova, who was the overwhelming favorite given her ITF junior ranking of 13, defeated American qualifier Gracie Epps 6-2, 6-1 in the final. Fruhvirtova, who also won the doubles title with her sister Brenda yesterday, lost only 15 games in her five victories this week. It is somewhat surprising that she has only two Junior Circuit singles titles, including this one, matching the number of Women's ITF singles titles she has after winning both last month.

Pinnington Jones, who was also heavily favored to win given his ITF ranking of 10, defeated No. 2 seed Leo Borg, son of Bjorn Borg, 6-1, 6-3. Pinnington Jones now has three ITF Junior Circuit singles titles, 2 Grade 2s and a Grade 1, and all have come since the restart last fall.

Two 19-year-old American men have advanced to finals at $15,000 ITF World Tennis Tour events this week, with Zane Khan attempting to win back-to-back tournaments in India, while Emilio Nava has earned a place in a Pro Circuit final for the first time in Spain.

The unseeded Khan, who has now won nine straight matches in India without dropping set, defeated three seeds to advance to the final, where he'll face another, No. 3 seed Aidan McHugh of Great Britain. 

Nava, who had fallen in the semifinals on four other occasions in the past two years, won three qualifying matches just to get into the main draw, defeated top seed Javier Barranco Cosano of Spain in the quarterfinals. He will take on No. 3 seed Nikolas Sanchez Isquierdo of Spain in Sunday's final.

The Division I tennis season is heating up now with the weather, and there were a couple of notable upsets this week. The second-ranked Baylor men were beaten by No. 12 Texas A&M 4-3 in College Station Thursday. Not only had Baylor beaten Texas A&M 4-1 in the Kickoff Weekend final last month, the Aggies were playing without Hady Habib, who plays at line 1.

In women's ACC play, No. 13 Georgia Tech collected its second win of the year over No. 6 Duke yesterday, this time by a 5-2 score. Georgia Tech had beaten Duke 4-3 in the Kickoff Weekend final back in January. Only six days earlier, Georgia Tech had lost to No. 32 Wake Forest 7-0, in one of the more puzzling results of the year.

And in Southern California Friday, the fourth-ranked Pepperdine women defeated No. 5 UCLA 4-3 Friday, with Jessica Failla clinching for the Waves with a 7-6(3), 4-6, 6-4 win over Jada Hart at line 2. UCLA had beaten Pepperdine 4-2 in a consolation match at the Team Indoor Championships last month. 

The doubles final at the WTA 250 in Guadalajara was contested by four former collegians, with No. 3 seeds Astra Sharma(Vanderbilt) and Ellen Perez(Georgia) defeating top seeds Desirae Krawczyk(Arizona State) and Mexico's Giuliana Olmos(USC) 6-4, 6-4. It is the first title for Sharma and Perez as a team. 

I'm not sure why Krawczyk and Guarachi split up this week, after winning a title in Adelaide last month, but Guarachi went to the Middle East from Australia and won her biggest title at this week's WTA 1000 in Dubai. Guarachi and partner Darija Jurak of Croatia, seeded No. 8, defeated the unseeded Chinese team of Yifan Xu and Zhaoxuan Yang 6-0, 6-3 in the final.