December Aces; Kotzen and Charney Sweep 18s USTA Winter Nationals Titles, Lee and Goetz Claim Gold in 16s Singles

Before we get to the today's results at the USTA 18s and 16s Winter National Championships in Lake Nona, make sure you check out my December Aces column for the Tennis Recruiting Network. If you took a break from tennis and missed my daily coverage here or my recaps at TRN, it's a great way to get up to speed on what happened at the big tournaments last month in Florida. With 15 champions from those events, there wasn't room for much else, but three former collegians had success at ATP Challengers and Davis Cup, and the USTA's Lew Brewer also deserved recognition on the occasion of his retirement.

Nicolas Kotzen and Piper Charney swept the 18s titles today at the USTA National Campus, winning both the singles and doubles championships. Kotzen defeated Lucas Brown 7-5, 6-1 for the singles championship and also got the better of Brown in the doubles final, with partner Bjorn Swenson. Kotzen and Swenson defeated Brown and Grant Lothringer 3-6, 6-3, 6-3 in the final. 

Charney, the younger sister of USC recruit Emma Charney, won three three-setters early in the tournament, and she needed a third set today against Duke recruit Katie Codd before recording a 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 victory. Charney and Natalie Block won the doubles championship, beating Ava Bruno and Erin Ha 6-1, 6-1 in the final.

I watched the two 16s finals via Playsight, with Mitchell Lee defeating Andrew Ena 6-1, 6-4 and Taylor Goetz beating Pearlie Zhang 7-5, 6-3. Lee breezed through the first set in 30 minutes, with Ena unable to hold serve, but fell behind 2-0 in the second set. He got the break back in the fourth game, then held for 4-3 and broke at love for 5-3. He was not able to serve it out, but he broke Ena in the final game to earn the gold ball.

Goetz, the younger sister of University of Virginia senior Ryan, trailed Zhang 5-2 in the 72-minute first set, with Zhang serving for the set at 5-2, and 5-4. But Goetz went on a run that saw her win seven games in a row to take a 2-0 lead in the second set. Zhang managed to get back on serve when she broke Goetz serving at 4-2 in the second set, but she was broken in the next game and Goetz finished the job there, after two hours and 19 minutes.

The results from the 12s and 14s in Tucson haven't been updated yet, so I'll save those for tomorrow's post, but below are all today's results from the 16s and 18s.

B16s

Singles Final:

Mitchell Lee[2] d. Andrew Ena[4] 6-1, 6-4

Third place:

Lucas Coriaty d. Ari Cotoulas[1] 6-3, 6-4

Fifth place:

Ian Bracks[10]d. Nicholas Mangiapane 6-1, 6-1

Doubles Final:

Xander Barber and Stiles Brockett d. Kaveh Taheri and Tyler Nguyen 6-3, 6-2

Third place:

Krish Arora and AJ Mercer[4] d. Jackson Kirby and Jacob Smith[14] 6-1, 3-6, 7-6(6)

B18s

Singles Final:

Nicolas Kotzen[23] d. Lucas Brown[18] 7-5, 6-1

Third place:

Emon Van Loben Sels[14] d. Ryan Torres 6-3, 7-5

Fifth place:

Aadarsh Tripathi[17] d. Kian Vakili[6] 6-4, 4-1, ret. inj.

Doubles Final:

Nicolas Kotzen and Bjorn Swenson d. Lucas Brown and Grant Lothringer[1] 3-6, 6-3, 6-3

Third place:

Jelani Sarr and Lincoln Battle[2] d. Landon Ardila and Marko Mesarovic[17] 7-6(6), 7-6(5)

G16s

Singles Final:

Taylor Goetz[22] d. Pearlie Zhang[13] 7-5, 6-3

Third place: 

Claire An[19] d. Sophia Webster[15] 2-6, 7-5, 7-5

Fifth place: 

Alyssa Ahn[27] d. Natasha Rajaram 6-4, 6-2

Doubles Final:

Olivia Center and Kate Fakih[4] d. Elena Zhao and Mia Yamakita 3-6, 7-5, 6-4

Third place:

Meg McCarty and Ellie Morrow d. Claire Zhang and Sabrina Lin 2-6, 6-2, 6-2

G18s

Singles Final:

Piper Charney[26] d. Katie Codd[7] 6-4, 3-6, 6-3

Third place:

Tsehay Driscoll d. Ava Bruno 6-7(9), 6-4, 6-1

Fifth place:

Sophia Wang[12] d. Gayathri Krishnan 6-2, 7-6(2)

Doubles Final:

Piper Charney and Natalie Block[4] d. Ava Bruno and Erin Ha 6-1, 6-1

Third place:

Katie Codd and Bojana Pozder d. Zoe Lulu and Naomi Karki 4-6, 6-1, 6-2