Basavareddy Reaches Fairfield Challenger Final; Crawley Defeats Grant, Faces Beck for Title at Florence $25K; Starodubtseva Goes for Sweep Sunday at Rancho Santa Fe $60K; Ganesan Defends Doubles Title at ITF J500 in Osaka
Last year at this time then Stanford freshman Nishesh Basavareddy was having a breakout fall in his first few months in Division I college tennis, winning the consolation tournament at the All-American Championships, then following a few weeks later with the title at the ITA National Fall Championships.
This fall, Basavareddy is having a breakout fall on the ATP Challenger circuit, reaching the quarterfinals last week in Tiburon and, after his 3-6, 7-5, 6-3 win over Steve Johnson(USC) today, the final at the ATP Challenger 75 in Fairfield California.
The 18-year-old from Indiana wasn't able to find the same level he had reached and sustained in his 6-3, 6-3 quarterfinal win over top seed Alex Michelsen today against Johnson, but he found a way to victory. Down a set and a break at 4-2 in the second set, Basavareddy won five of the next six games. Despite that momentum, he then lost the opening game of the third set, but rebounded to take six of the next seven games to reach his first Challenger final.
Basavareddy, now inside the ATP Top 500 in the live rankings, will face Tiburon champion Zachary Svajda, with the No. 4 seed beating No. 8 seed Alexander Ritschard(Virginia) of Switzerland 6-3, 6-1. The 20-year-old Svajda defeated Basavareddy in last week's quarterfinal in Tiburon 6-0, 6-2. Svajda's younger brother Trevor also has a recent win over Basavareddy, taking a 7-6(3), 6-1 decision in the semifinals of the Kalamazoo 18s Nationals in August.
In the doubles final earlier today, top seeds Evan King(Michigan) and Reese Stalder(TCU) defeated unseeded Denis Kudla and Vasil Kirkov 7-5, 6-3.
Two of the top Division I women's players in 2022-23 will face off Sunday in Florence South Carolina for a first USTA Pro Circuit singles title. Unseeded North Carolina senior Fiona Crawley defeated 15-year-old wild card Tyra Grant 6-4, 5-7, 6-3 to reach her second $25K final this year.
Duke's Chloe Beck, who turned pro this summer with one year of eligibility remaining, advanced to her first Pro Circuit singles final with a 7-5, 7-5 win over Whitney Osuigwe. Beck, also unseeded, had defeated top seed Panna Udvardy of Hungary in Friday's quarterfinals.
Although both Crawley and Beck played at the top of their college lineups nearly all of last year, they met only once, with that match going unfinished.
A third Research Triangle team picked up the doubles title today in Florence, with NC State senior Abigail Rencheli and recent graduate Alana Smith, the No. 2 seeds, beating unseeded Ayana Akli, a fifth-year at South Carolina, and Nicole Rivkin of Israel, a Texas A&M sophomore who transferred from Texas this summer, 3-6, 7-6(8), 10-6. It's the second Pro Circuit title this year for Rencheli and Smith.
At the women's $60,000 USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Rancho Santa Fe California, former Old Dominion All-American Yuliia Starodubtseva will look to win both the singles and doubles titles Sunday. The fourth-seeeded 23-year-old from Ukraine, who has already won two $60K titles this year, defeated USC redshirt junior Snow Han, a qualifier, 6-3, 6-4 in today's semifinals. She will face former Texas star Lulu Sun of Switzerland, the No. 8 seed, who defeated No. 7 seed Anastasia Tikhonova of Russia 6-3, 6-2.
After reaching the singles final, Starodubtseva partnered with Makenna Jones(UNC) for the doubles championship (CORRECTION: this was the doubles semifinal, not final). The No. 3 seeds defeated No. 2 seeds Tikhonova and Maria Herazo Gonzalez of Colombia 6-3, 6-3 to reach the final.
The singles finals are set for later tonight at the ITF J500 in Osaka Japan, with neither of the top seeds in them. No. 4 seed Emerson Jones of Australia defeated top seed Kaitlin Quevedo 7-6(3), 6-3, and will play No. 11 seed Kristiana Sidorova of Russia, who beat No. 2 seed Laura Samsonova of the Czech Republic 7-5, 6-1.
No. 4 seed Nicolai Budkov Kjaer of Norway defeated top seed Federico Cina of Italy 7-6(2), 6-3 and will play No. 2 seed Joel Schwaerzler of Austria for the title. Schwaerzler beat No. 3 seed Rei Sakamoto of Japan 5-7, 7-6(0), 6-3.Kalamazoo 18s doubles champion Adhithya Ganesan(Cornell), who won the doubles title last year in Osaka with Asahi Harazaki of Japan, partnered with Tianhui Zhang of China for the title this year. The No. 4 seeds defeated No. 7 seeds Jangjun Kim of Korea and Hugh Winter of Australia 6-2, 3-6, 10-8 in the final.
0 comments:
Post a Comment