Ten-Point Tiebreaker to End Final Sets at Slams, Including Juniors; New D-I Rankings Disagree on Men's No.1; Georgia Women Blank No. 4 Ohio State; Quinn, Michelsen, Kuzuhara Advance at Bakersfield $25K; Fritz Through to BNP Paribas Quarterfinals

The four slams announced today that they were adopting a uniform approach to the end of matches, with the final sets in men's and women's singles and doubles utilizing a 10-point tiebreaker at 6-all in the final set, beginning at this year's French Open. The announcement describes this change as a trial that will be reviewed after a "full grand slam year," which I assume is after the 2023 Australian Open.

Until this decision, all four slams had different methods for determining a winner, with Australia using the format just adopted, the US Open using a 7-point tiebreaker, Wimbledon playing a 7-point tiebreaker at 12-all, and the French Open requiring a two-game advantage, with no tiebreaker.

This change also applies to the junior slam championships, although it is not a momentous one; in 2021, all four slams played 7-point tiebreakers if a match was 6-all in the third set. Before 2021, Wimbledon juniors played the third set out, requiring a two-game advantage, but last year they used a final set tiebreaker. So this is a minor change for juniors, and one I personally like, as it is more forgiving than the 7-point tiebreaker.

It appears from the announcement that Wimbledon will return to having the juniors play a full third set in doubles, after playing a 10-point tiebreaker for the third set last year. They have never played no-ad at Wimbledon. The other three junior slams have all adopted the format of ITF, ATP, and WTA doubles, with no-ad scoring and a 10-point breaker in lieu of a third set.

It's still early in the college tennis dual match season, but not too early to have a disagreement over the top spot in the men's team rankings.  The USTA/Tennis Channel poll has Ohio State at No. 1, while the ITA's computer algorithm has put Florida at No. 1, by the tiniest of margins. Below is the Top 10 from each source:

ITA Men's Division I Team Top 10 March 16, 2022
(previous week's ranking in parentheses)
1. Florida (4)
2. Ohio State (2)
3. TCU (3)
4. Tennessee (1)
5. Wake Forest (5)
6. Baylor (5)
7. South Carolina (7)
8. Georgia (8)
9. Stanford (10)
10. Harvard (13)

USTA/Tennis Channel Men's Team Top 10 March 16, 2022
1. Ohio State (2)
2. TCU (3)
3. Florida (5)
4. Baylor (4)
5. Tennessee (1)
6. Wake Forest (6)
7. South Carolina (7)
8. Stanford (8)
9. Georgia (9)
10. Virginia (10)

As you can see, the voters are not as high on Florida as the computer is. Other notable discrepancies: Harvard 10(ITA)/15(USTA), Oklahoma 37(ITA)/19(USTA) and Mississippi 31(ITA/18(USTA)

The women's No. 1, in both rankings, continues to be undefeated North Carolina, who did not play last week. 

ITA Women's Division I Team Top 10 March 16, 2022

1. North Carolina (1)

2. NC State (2)

3. Oklahoma (3)

4. Ohio State (4)

5. Duke (5)

6. Texas (8)

7. Auburn (9)

8. Pepperdine (6)

9. Oklahoma State (7)

10. Miami (12)

USTA/Tennis Channel Women's Team Top 10 March 16, 2022

1. North Carolina (1)

2. Oklahoma (2)

3. NC State (3)

4. Ohio State (4)

5. Texas (5)

T6. Duke (7)

T6. Texas A&M (6)

8. Pepperdine (8)

9. Virginia (9)

10. Georgia (10)

The notable disagreements in the women's rankings: Auburn 7(ITA)/12(USTA), Texas A&M 12(ITA)/T6(USTA), Oklahoma State 9(ITA)/16(USTA) and Stanford 24(ITA)/11(USTA)

The Georgia women have been moving steadily up the rankings after finally playing regular matches and are 15 in the ITA rankings this week. They should go much higher after today, when, indoors, they defeated No. 4 Ohio State 7-0 in Athens, their first Top 5 win since 2019. After taking the doubles point, the Bulldogs' two stellar freshmen, Mell Reasco at line 2 and Dasha Vidmanova at line 3, posted straight-sets victories, with veteran Lea Ma clinching for Georgia with a come-from-behind win over Irina Cantos Siemers at line 1. For more on the match, and the box score, see the Georgia website.

Three junior standouts advanced to the second round of the $25,000 USTA men's Pro Circuit tournament in Bakersfield California with wins today. Qualifier Ethan Quinn(Georgia) earned his first ATP point with a 6-4, 6-2 victory over 35-year-old Zhe Li of China; wild card Alex Michelsen, 2022 Australian Open boys doubles finalist, earned his first ATP point with a 6-2, 4-6, 6-3 win over qualifier Colin Markes(Texas); wild card Bruno Kuzuhara, Australian Open boys singles and doubles champion, came back to defeat Christian Langmo(Miami) 4-6, 7-6(5), 6-4. 

On Thursday, Quinn will face No. 8 seed Jonathan Mridha of Sweden; Michelsen takes on No. 5 seed JC Aragone(Virginia) and Kuzuhara plays either No. 6 seed Adrian Andreev of Bulgaria or qualifier Osgar O'Hoisin(Wisconsin) of Ireland.

All five Americans in the singles draws at the BNP Paribas Open were on Wednesday's schedule, but both Madison Keys and Jenson Brooksby are playing night matches, so I don't have results for them now.

Of the three completed matches featuring Americans, only Taylor Fritz won, with the No. 20 seed defeating No. 29 seed Alex De Minaur of Australia 3-6, 6-4, 7-6(5). John Isner[23] lost to Grigor Dimitrov of Bulgaria 6-3, 7-6(6) and Rafael Nadal[4] beat Reilly Opelka[17] 7-6(3), 7-6(5). 

Fritz, the 2015 ITF World Junior champion will play unseeded Miomir Kecmanovic of Serbia, the 2016 ITF World Junior champion, in Friday's quarterfinals.