Top Three Girls Seeds Out at ITF J500 Offenbach; First ATP Points for Lee, Woestendick at Vero Beach $15K; 122nd Edition of The Ojai Underway; SEC and Big Ten Women's Conference Awards Announced

The round of 16 is set at the ITF J500 in Offenbach Germany, with just one American and neither of the top two girls seeds still in contention. No. 11 seed Max Exsted advanced to the third round with a 3-6, 6-4, 6-2 win over Sergio Planella Hernandez of Spain today; on Thursday he will face unseeded Joaquin Guilleme of Nicaragua for a spot in the quarterfinals.

The top two seeds in the boys draw, Nicolai Budkov Kjaer of Norway and Luca Preda of Romania, have moved into the third round with two routine straight-sets wins, but the top three girls seeds are out, exiting in the first round. Top seed Emerson Jones of Australia lost to Nellie Taraba Wallberg of Sweden 6-0, 6-3, No. 2 seed Hannah Klugman of Great Britain was beaten by Vittoria Paganetti of Italy 6-4, 7-6(1) and Mingge Xu of Great Britain fell to Neus Torner Sensano of Spain 7-6(6), 6-1. It may be some consolation to that trio of seeds that all of the girls who beat them won their matches today and are through to the round of 16. 

No. 8 seed Katie Rolls, who won the last J500 this year, at the Banana Bowl in Brazil, lost in the second round to Eliska Tichackova of the Czech Republic 6-2, 6-2.

In my post Tuesday, I mentioned all the top juniors competing at this week's $15,000 men's USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Vero Beach Florida, and five advanced to Thursday's second round.  Seventeen-year-old Cooper Woestendick and 18-year-old Mitchell Lee earned their first ATP points, with Woestendick beating Jake Van Emburgh(Oklahoma/Ohio State) 7-5, 6-4 and Lee getting a 6-4 retired win over No. 4 seed Jaimee Floyd Angele of France. 

Kaylan Bigun, wild card Rudy Quan and Alexander Razeghi already have ATP rankings but added another point to their totals today. Bigun defeated Sekou Bangoura(Florida), who was playing in his first event in almost a year, 6-0, 6-1 in 57 minutes; Quan took out No. 6 seed Nathan Ponwith(Georgia/Arizona State) 6-0, 7-6(5) and Razeghi beat fellow 17-year-old Nikita Filin, a qualifier, 6-4, 6-4.

Razeghi gets No. 2 seed Garrett Johns(Duke) next, while Bigun faces qualifier Dian Nedev of Bulgaria, who beat top seed Christian Langmo(Miami)6-4, 6-7(2), 6-4.  Quan and Woestendick will play for a spot in the quarterfinals; in their only previous meeting, in the quarterfinals of last year's ITF J300 in Indian Wells, Woestendick won 6-3, 6-1. Lee will face fellow wild card Chad Kissell(Valparaiso) in the second round, after Kissell defeated qualifier Cody Benton 4-6, 6-1, 6-3.

For more on today's action in Vero Beach, including quotes from Kaylan Bigun and Rudy Quan, see this article from Harvey Fialkov. 

One of the oldest and most revered tennis tournaments in the United States began this week in Ojai California. The 122nd edition of the tournament will feature the final Pac-12 conference tournaments, with the upcoming realignments leading to the demise of undoubtedly the most significant conference in college tennis. Past Ojai competitors Bob and Mike Bryan are being honored this year for their contributions to the sport and will perform with their band after a fundraising dinner. A junior clinic with the twins is also on the schedule.

The tournament also features community college, Division III, juniors, boys high school and men's and women's opens in a festival of tennis on courts throughout the region. Draws for all events can be found under the tournament information tab on the Ojai home page.

Each year I try to post the Power Five (plus Ivy) conference awards, which are released in no particular order and no discernible schedule. The first two came out today, with the SEC announcing its women's all-conference first and second teams and all-freshmen team, as well as these top awards:

Player of the Year: Mary Stoiana, Texas A&M

Freshman of the Year: Lucciana Perez, Texas A&M

Coach of the Year: Drake Bernstein, Georgia

It was a good day to be a Luciana and a Bernstein, as the Big Ten's freshman and coach of the year mirroring those of the SEC. The Big Ten also revealed its team sportsmanship awards as well as all-conference teams.

Player of the Year: Kari Miller, Michigan 

Freshman of the Year: Luciana Perry, Ohio State

  

Coach of the Year: Ronni Bernstein, Michigan