May Aces; Shelton Leaves Florida, Saia Joins Clemson; Exsted and Grant Qualify for Roland Garros Junior Championships; Stephens Reaches Fourth Round

May always seems overloaded with tennis, with the NCAA championships in the spotlight throughout the month, while the ITF Junior Circuit's big clay season gets underway in Europe. My monthly Aces column at the Tennis Recruiting Network features 18 of the top performances by current and former college players, as well as multiple titles by top juniors.

Yesterday's big news in Division I college tennis was the announcement that Boomer Saia would be leaving Iowa State to take the position of head coach for the Clemson women's program. In his five years in Ames, Saia took the Iowa State program from the bottom of the Big 12 to the NCAA team quarterfinals, amassing an untold number of firsts for the program. It's always a little bittersweet to see this, as you would hope that any Power Five school would have the resources to keep an outstanding coach, but sadly, that's not always the case, with Clemson's new(less than two years on the job) athletic director obviously willing and able to offer more support to its tennis programs. 

As significant a story as Saia's hiring at Clemson is, today's announcement that Bryan Shelton would be leaving his position as men's head coach at Florida is another level of bombshell. Shelton, who won the 2007 NCAA women's team championship while coaching the Georgia Tech women, took over the Florida job in 2012 and with the Florida men's first NCAA team title in 2021, became the first head coach to win both the women's and men's team titles.  

Shelton will accompanying his son Ben, the 2022 NCAA singles champion, on the ATP Tour, so he will still be coaching, just not a team. College tennis will not be the same without him, but the ATP Tour has gained a great addition to its coaching ranks.

The qualifying for the Roland Garros Junior Championships concluded today, with two Americans reaching the main draw.

Tyra Grant, who was the top seed in qualifying, had no difficulty earning her spot. The 15-year-old, who is currently No. 32 in the ITF junior rankings, defeated her Milan J500 doubles partner Hephzibah Oluwadare of Great Britain 6-0, 6-1 in today's final round of qualifying. Grant lost only one game in her two matches.

Maxwell Exsted, who won three qualifying matches and earned a main draw win in Milan, also reached the main draw in Paris, defeating No. 5 seed Aryan Shah of India 6-3, 6-3.

No. 6 seed Ashton Bowers was beaten 6-1, 6-1 by Mia Ristic of Serbia, who, with a WTA ranking of 425, just missed the WTA Top 400 cutoff for main draw entry. 

Cooper Woestendick lost his final round qualifying match 6-2, 6-0 to Hoyoung Roh of Korea.

The draws are not yet out; with the tournament beginning Sunday, the draws should be available Saturday, as should the order of play, at the Roland Garros website.  Iva Jovic, who would have been seeded, withdrew with an injury last week.

At the J300 Astrid Bowl warmup in Belgium, No. 4 seeds Valeria Ray and Alexia Harmon took the girls doubles title today, defeating unseeded Mia Slama and Rose Marie Nijkamp of the Netherlands 6-1, 6-1. 

Sloane Stephens was the only American to win her third round match today at Roland Garros; six more will try to join her by winning their third round matches Saturday. Below are today's results and Saturday's matchups. This is the third year in a row that Stephens has advanced to the fourth round; she reached the quarterfinals last year.

Friday's third round results of Americans:

Elise Mertens[28](BEL) d. Jessica Pegula[3] 6-1, 6-3

Daria Kasatkina[9](RUS) d. Peyton Stearns 6-0, 6-1 

Sloane Stephens d. Yulia Putintseva(KAZ) 6-3, 3-6, 6-2

Saturday's third round matches featuring Americans:

Coco Gauff[6] v Mirra Andreeva[Q](RUS)

Kayla Day[Q] v Anna Karolina Schmiedlova(SVK)

Bernarda Pera v Elisabetta Cocciaretto(ITA)

Taylor Fritz[9] v Francisco Cerundolo[23](ARG)

Frances Tiafoe[12] v Alexander Zverev[22](GER)

Marcos Giron v Nicolas Jarry(CHI)