Tien Wins Third Straight, Pareja Claims First Title at Rancho Santa Fe $15Ks; Spizzirri Earns Second $25K Title; Paul Captures ATP 500 Queens Club Championship; Wimbledon Men's Qualifying Features Seven Americans

Eighteen-year-old Learner Tien swept through his third consecutive SoCal Pro Series tournament today at the men's $15,000 tournament in Rancho Santa Fe California. The two-time defending Kalamazoo 18s champion, who played one semester at USC in 2023, defeated qualifier Matthew Summers of Great Britain 6-3, 6-1 in under an hour to post his 15th consecutive victory since returning from three-month layoff.

Tien, who won back-to-back titles at the Barnes Tennis Center in San Diego the first two weeks of SoCal Pro Series before taking a week off last week, was particularly impressive in Rancho Santa Fe, winning all his matches in straight sets and giving up no more than four games in any of the ten sets he won.  He defeated last week's champion Oliver Tarvet(San Diego) of Great Britain 6-1, 6-4 in the second round and SMU's Trevor Svajda, the No. 6 seed, 6-3, 6-4 in yesterday's semifinals. He is not playing the $15K in Los Angeles this coming week, and I anticipate he'll return to the Challenger level in the coming weeks, after reaching two Challenger quarterfinals in January.

In the doubles final played last night, No. 2 seeds Patrick Maloney(Michigan) and Australian Joshua Charlton(Oregon) defeated Svajda and teammate Adam Neff 7-6(5), 6-4. It's the second Pro Circuit doubles title for Maloney and the fourth for Charlton.

While Tien is still just 18, the women's Rancho Santa Fe W15 champion is a full three years younger, with wild card Julieta Pareja taking her first title this afternoon with a 5-7, 6-1, 6-4 win over No. 7 seed Kimmi Hance(UCLA) in the first Pro Circuit final for both. Pareja, currently 190 in the ITF junior rankings, came back from a set down four times in her five victories, which included wins over three seeds.

In the women's doubles final last night, the Campana sisters, Anna and Carolyn, won their first Pro Circuit title, with the unseeded pair, who played at Wake Forest and Pepperdine, defeating unseeded Brandy Walker(Northern Arizona) and Jessica Alsola(Cal) of Canada 6-2, 6-3.

Unseeded Eliot Spizzirri earned his second USTA Pro Circuit $25K title today in Tulsa, with the recent University of Texas All-American defeating No. 2 seed Bernard Tomic(Australia) 6-4, 3-6, 7-6(3). Spizzirri, the ITA Player of Year for 2023 and 2024, had reached the final of last week's $25K in Wichita; his first $25K title came back in 2021 in Decatur Illinois. 

Cadence Brace of Canada won the W35 in Wichita, with the No. 8 seed beating top seed Victoria Hu(Princeton) 7-5, 4-6, 6-3. It's the first Pro Circuit title for the 19-year-old Brace.

Tommy Paul won the biggest title of his career today at the ATP 500 at Queen's Club in London, with the No. 5 seed defeating Lorenzo Musetti of Italy 6-1, 7-6(8) in the final.

With the title Paul will move to 12 in the ATP rankings, and will become the No. 1 American for the first time, with Taylor Fritz dropping to No. 13.

For more on Paul's victory, see this article from the ATP.

Paul was not the only American to claim a grass court title today, with Jessica Pegula taking the WTA 500 in Berlin, saving five match points in her 6-7(0), 6-4, 7-6(3) win over Anna Kalinskaya of Russia.

For more on Pegula's title, see this article from the WTA.

Wimbledon qualifying begins Monday for the men, with seven Americans attempting to advance to the main draw: Emilio Nava[30], Nicolas Moreno de Alboran(UC-Santa Barbara), Zachary Svajda[24], Patrick Kypson(Texas A&M), Tristan Boyer(Stanford), Maxime Cressy(UCLA) and Denis Kudla. 

ESPN+ will be providing coverage of Show Court 1, which will feature the matches of Oliver Crawford(Florida) and Kudla on Monday.

Spizzirri Advances to Second Straight $25K Final; Tien Aims for Third Straight $15K Title; Pareja and Hance Reach Rancho Santa Fe Final; Hu Seeks Second Title Sunday; Wimbledon Wild Card Update

ITA Player of the Year Eliot Spizzirri has advanced to another final at the $25,000 level on the USTA Pro Circuit, his second in as many weeks. The unseeded 22-year-old from Connecticut, who ended his decorated collegiate career at Texas last month, advanced by defeating Alex Kotzen(Columbia, Tennessee) 6-2, 7-5, his fourth straight-sets victory of the week at the $25K in Tulsa Oklahoma. Spizzirri, who lost last week's final in Wichita to teammate Micah Braswell, a result he avenged in Friday's quarterfinals, will play No. 2 seed Bernard Tomic of Australia. Tomic defeated rising Columbia junior Nick Kotzen 6-4, 6-2 in today's other semifinal. 

In the Tulsa doubles final today, two unseeded teams met for the title, with Aidan Kim(Florida, Ohio State) and Cannon Kingsley(Ohio State) defeating Canadian Cleeve Harper(Texas) and Govind Nanda(UCLA) 6-3, 5-7, 10-7.  It's the first Pro Circuit title for the 19-year-old Kim and the third for Kingsley.

Top seed Learner Tien(USC) picked up his 14th straight victory on the SoCal Pro Circuit in today's Rancho Santa Fe $15K semifinals. The 18-year-old from Irvine California defeated No. 6 seed Trevor Svajda(SMU) 6-3, 6-4 in a rematch of the 2023 Kalamazoo 18s final, also won by Tien in straight sets. Standing in the way of Tien's third straight title is 25-year-old Matthew Summers(Denver) of Great Britain, who beat fellow qualifier Jay Friend(Arizona) 6-3, 6-3 to reach his first Pro Circuit final.

UCLA rising senior Kimmi Hance will play in her first USTA Pro Circuit singles final Sunday after the 21-year-old from Torrance, seeded No. 7, squeezed past teammate Anne Christine Lutkemeyer, a qualifier, 5-7, 6-0, 7-6(6).

Hance's opponent will be 15-year-old wild card Julieta Pareja, who is also seeking her first Pro Circuit singles title. Pareja, who is from nearby Carlsbad, defeated rising USC sophomore Lily Fairclough of Australia 6-4, 6-1 in the second W15 semifinal in Rancho Santa Fe.

Victoria Hu will play for her second W35 title in the past three weeks Sunday at the USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Wichita Kansas. The former Princeton Tiger, seeded No. 1, won a second straight three-hour battle Saturday, defeating No. 3 seed Sahaja Yamalapalli of India 6-4, 0-6, 7-5. Hu will face No. 8 seed Cadence Brace of Canada, who beat Jessica Failla(USC, Pepperdine) 6-3, 6-4.

In the Wichita doubles final, former Baylor stars Alicia Herrero Linana of Spain and Melany Solange Krywol of Argentina won their fourth title of the year and their sixth as a team, with the No. 3 seeds defeating 18-year-olds Sophia Webster(Vanderbilt) and Ashton Bowers(Texas) 6-3, 6-3. 

The updated Wimbledon wild card list has been released, with all the qualifying wild cards distributed (three were not used for the men) and most of the doubles wild cards. Former Florida All-American Oliver Crawford, who switched to Great Britain from the US at the beginning of this year, received a men's doubles wild card with Kyle Edmund. Amelia Rajecki(NC State) also received a women's doubles wild card, with Naiktha Bains. 

There is still one women's main draw singles wild card showing as To Be Announced. Qualifying begins Monday, and the draws will come out tomorrow, so that should be granted or passed on soon.

Qualifier Kotzen Ousts Top Seed Krueger at Tulsa $25K, Spizzirri Avenges Last Week's Loss; 15-Year-Old Pareja Beats No. 2 Seed at Rancho Santa Fe W15; Rajecki Wins Wimbledon Qualifying Wild Card in Playoff

The Kotzen family makes up half of the semifinalists at the men's $25,000 USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Tulsa after 23-year-old Alex and 21-year-old Nick won their quarterfinal matches today in contrasting fashion. Alex, who completed his Ivy League eligibility this year at Columbia, but will be using a fifth year at Tennessee, defeated Hawaii All-American Andre Ilagan, the No. 7 seed, 6-1, 6-3 in an hour and 21 minutes.  In the meantime, Nick, a rising junior at Columbia, was facing top seed Mitchell Krueger, currently 189 in the ATP ranking, and it was the qualifier who came out on top in the three-hour and 10-minute battle, 3-6, 7-6(2), 7-6(5). 

The Kotzens are still one more win away from a family final, with Alex facing No. 2 seed Bernard Tomic of Australia, the only seed remaining, and Nick taking on Eliot Spizzirri(Texas). Tomic took out Govind Nanda(UCLA) 6-3, 6-1; Spizzirri avenged his loss in Sunday's Wichita $25K final, beating teammate Micah Braswell 6-3, 6-2. Alex beat Nick last week in the first round of Wichita.

Fifteen-year-old Julieta Pareja has advanced to her first semifinal at a women's W15 tournament, beating No. 2 seed Sara Daavettila(North Carolina) 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 today at the SoCal Pro Series tournament in Rancho Santa Fe. Wild card Pareja, who reached her first Pro Circuit quarterfinal two weeks ago in San Diego, will play Australian Lily Fairclough, a rising sophomore at USC, who defeated Brandy Walker(Northern Arizona) 4-6, 6-3, 7-6(2). In the top half, UCLA teammates and doubles partners Anne Lutkemeyer and Kimmi Hance will meet for the first time on the Pro Circuit after quarterfinal wins today. No. 7 seed Hance defeated No. 3 seed Basak Eraydin of Turkey 6-3, 6-3; Lukemeyer continued her dominance over Anna Campana(Wake Forest, Pepperdine) getting her second win in two weeks and third straight in the past year, this one by a score of 6-3, 7-5.

A rematch of the 2023 Kalamazoo 18s final is on tap for Saturday at the men's $15K in Rancho Santa Fe, with top seed Learner Tien(USC) taking on No. 6 seed Trevor Svajda(SMU). Tien, who has sailed through his first three matches this week and has now won 13 consecutive matches on the SoCal Pro Series, defeated No. 8 seed Jacob Brumm(Cal,Baylor) 6-0, 6-1. Svajda beat 2021 Division III champion Leo Vittoontien(Carelton College) of Japan 6-3, 6-1 to set up a second meeting with Tien since the Kalamazoo final, which Tien won 6-0, 6-4, 6-4. Tien won their second round match in the Austin $25K last fall 6-4, 5-7, 10-1, with rain forcing match tiebreakers in lieu of a third set that day.

In the bottom half, two qualifiers will meet in the semifinals, not all that surprising given that seven of the 16 players in the bottom half came through qualifying. Arizona rising senior Jay Friend of Japan defeated UCLA rising junior Aadarth Tripathi 4-6, 6-3, 7-6(3) in today's quarterfinals and will face Matthew Summers(Denver) of Great Britain.  Summers defeated 2013 Kalamazoo champion Collin Altamirano(Virginia) 7-6(3), 7-5.

In addition to Tien, the other top seed still alive is Victoria Hu(Princeton), who barely survived her quarterfinal encounter with Hiroko Kuwata of Japan 6-3, 3-6, 7-6(7) at the W35 in Wichita.  Hu will play No. 3 seed Sahaja Yamalapalli of India, who beat UCF rising sophomore Oliver Lincer of Poland 6-1, 6-1. In the bottom half, No. 5 seed Jessica Failla(USC, Pepperdine) will play No. 8 seed Cadence Brace of Canada after Failla defeated Kayla Cross of Canada 6-4 retired and Brace ended the run of Kate Fakih 6-2, 6-1.

Recent NC State graduate Amelia Rajecki, who did not initally receive a qualifying wild card into Wimbledon, won one instead in the LTA Wimbledon qualifying wild card playoff, which began Thursday and concluded today. The unseeded Rajecki, the ITA National Senior Player of the Year, defeated the No. 2 and No. 4 seeds, as well as an unseeded player in between to earn one of the two qualifying wild cards. Top seed Katy Dunne earned the other. 

The men's winners from today's results are Anton Matusevich and Stuart Parker. Information circulating today indicates that Charlie Broom(Dartmouth, Baylor), originally given a qualifying wild card, has had that upgraded to the one remaining men's main draw wild card.

Seven Former Collegians Make US Olympic Team; Fakih Beats Stoiana at Wichita W35; Pareja Advances to Rancho Santa Fe W15 Quarterfinals; $25K Tulsa Rematch for Spizzirri and Braswell

The USTA announced the players who will represent the United States at next month's Olympics in Paris, with seven of the 11 former NCAA Division I collegiate stars.  The Olympic tennis event will run from July 27 through August 4 at Roland Garros.

In singles, the criteria for nominations limits any country to its four players with the highest rankings, as long as they were in the WTA or ATP Top 56 on the acceptance date, which was June 10. 

The team includes Coco Gauff, Jessica Pegula, Danielle Collins(Virginia) and Emma Navarro(Virginia) for women's singles, and Taylor Fritz, Tommy Paul, Chris Eubanks(Georgia Tech) and Marcos Giron(UCLA) for men's singles. Rajeev Ram(Illinois) and Austin Krajicek(Texas A&M) are nominated for doubles, with Fritz and Paul also accepted as a doubles team. Desirae Krawczyk(Arizona State) will play with Collins in doubles, with Gauff and Pegula also accepted as a doubles team. The US mixed doubles team will be announced at a later date.

USTA head of women's tennis Kathy Rinaldi is the women's coach, with US Davis Cup captain Bob Bryan serving as the men's coach.

US players who would have been eligible by ranking, but opted not to participate are Ben Shelton(Florida), Sebastian Korda and Francis Tiafoe on the men's side, and Madison Keys on the women's side. 

For more on the 2024 tennis Olympians, including results in previous Olympics and at Roland Garros, can be found here.

Last night at the W35 women's USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Wichita, ITA Player of the Year Mary Stoiana of Texas A&M defeated No. 2 seed Akasha Urhobo 6-3, 6-7(9), 6-0; in today's second round, UCLA rising freshman Kate Fakih took out the nation's top-ranked collegian 5-7, 6-2, 6-3 in just over three hours. Fakih, a 17-year-old from Pasadena California, reached the semifinals of a 2023 SoCal Pro Series tournament last summer, but this is her first quarterfinal above the W15 level. She will face No. 8 seed Cadence Brace of Canada next.

UCF rising sophomore Olivia Lincer of Poland kept her winning streak alive, with last week's W15 champion in the Dominican Republic, who received a special exemption into the main draw this week, beating 16-year-old qualifier Rachael Smith 7-6(1), 6-1 in today's second round. Fakih, Jessica Failla(USC, Pepperdine) and the winner of tonight's match between top seed Victoria Hu(Princeton) and Amelia Honer(UC-Santa Barbara) are the only Americans remaining.

Fifteen-year-old Julieta Pareja of Carlsbad California received a wild card into the SoCal Pro Series W15 this week in Rancho Santa Fe and she has made the most of it, advancing to the quarterfinals with a 3-6, 7-6(1), 6-2 win over No. 6 seed Jessica Alsola(Cal) of Canada. Pareja, who also reached the quarterfinals at the W15 in San Diego two weeks ago, will finally earn a WTA ranking, after she has now earned points in three tournaments. She will play No. 2 seed Sara Daavettila(North Carolina).

UCLA rising junior Anne Lutkemeyer, who beat top seed Amy Zhu(Michigan) in the first round, reached the quarterfinals for the second week in a row, with the 20-year-old qualifier defeating Carolyn Campana(Wake Forest, Vanderbilt, Pepperdine) 7-6(4), 6-1. She plays the younger Campana sister, Anna,(Wake Forest, Pepperdine) next.

At the men's $15,000 tournament in Rancho Santa Fe, just three seeds have advanced to the quarterfinals, all in the top half. No. 1 seed Learner Tien(USC) beat San Diego All-American Oliver Tarvet of Great Britain 6-1, 6-4 to run his winning streak to 12 in the SoCal Pro Series; the 18-year-old will face No. 8 seed Jacob Brumm(Cal, Baylor) in the quarterfinals. No. 6 seed Trevor Svajda, who Tien beat in the 2023 Kalamazoo 18s final, reached the quarterfinals with a 6-3, 6-2 win over Ohio State All-American Jack Anthrop. 

In the bottom half, No. 2 seed Strong Kirchheimer was beaten today by qualifier Aadarth Tripathi, a rising junior at UCLA, 2-6, 7-5, 6-3, while No. 3 seed Alex Knaff(Florida State) of Luxembourg lost to Matthew Summers of Great Britain 6-1, 2-6, 6-4.

After meeting in the final of last week's men's $25,000 USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Wichita, Texas teammates Eliot Spizzirri and Micah Braswell will play again this week at the $25,000 tournament in Tulsa, this time in the quarterfinals. 

Wichita champion Braswell, who beat No. 4 seed Cannon Kingsley(Ohio State) in two tiebreakers in the first round, defeated qualifier Luis Carlos Alvarez Valdes of Mexico 6-4, 6-4, while Spizzirri defeated Elio Jose Ribeiro Lago of Italy 6-2, 6-1.

Top seed Mitchell Krueger has advanced to the quarterfinals, as have both Kotzen brothers of Columbia. Qualifier Nick beat No. 6 seed Filip Peliwo of Poland 6-3, 3-6, 6-2 and Alex, who will be playing at Tennessee this fall as a graduate transfer, defeated qualifier Oliver Okonkwo(Illinois) of Great Britain 6-1, 6-2.

Wimbledon Main Draw Wild Cards Include 2023 Junior Champion Searle and TCU All-American Fearnley; Ngounoue and Four Top British Juniors Receive Qualifying Wild Cards; Lutkemeyer Ousts Top Seed in Rancho Santa Fe; Del Potro to Open Junior Academy in Florida

Most of the Wimbledon wild cards were announced today, with just one men's singles and one women's singles main draw wild card yet to be awarded. Those traditionally go to players who win the ATP Challenger 125 in Ilkley and the ITF Women's 100 in Ilkley this week.

The women's main draw wild cards include four former slam champions: Angelique Kerber of Germany, Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark, Naomi Osaka of Japan and Emma Raducanu of Great Britain. The other three announced today are Great Britain's Heather Watson, Francesca Jones and Lily Miyazaki(Oklahoma). 

The men's main draw wild cards do not include any stars of the same magnitude as the women's, and all are British: Liam Broady, Jan Choinski, Arthur Fery(Stanford), Billy Harris, Paul Jubb(South Carolina), Jake Fearnley(TCU) and Henry Searle.

Fearnley's title at last week's Challenger in Nottingham no doubt led to his inclusion in the main draw; Charlie Broom(Dartmouth, Baylor), who lost to Fearnley in the final, was awarded a qualifying wild card. Searle, the Wimbledon boys champion in 2023, would normally be given a qualifying wild card, but he has had some success in Challengers this year and won three matches (two qualifying, one main) last week in Nottingham. 

Broom, who received a special exempt entry, is through to the second round of the Ilkley Challenger, where he'll play two-time Kalamazoo 18s champion Zachary Svajda. 

The qualifying wild cards for women are surprising, in that Amelia Rajecki, the recent NC State graduate, did not receive one. After beating two WTA Top 100 players over the weekend to qualify for the WTA 250 in Birmingham and giving former teammate and WTA Top 50 player Diana Shnaider a good battle in the first round, Rajecki had proven her level was certainly that of the Wimbledon qualifying field, but to no avail. There are still qualifying wild cards available for the playoff the LTA holds Thursday and Friday, so perhaps she still has an opportunity to earn a wild card that way.

2023 Wimbledon girls champion Clervie Ngounoue received the customary qualifying wild card given to the previous year's junior champions, but she has not played since the first of April, putting her participation in doubt. Three other juniors, all from Great Britain, received women's qualifying wild cards: Hannah Klugman(ITF Junior No. 6), Mingge Xu(9) and Mika Stojsavljevic(29). The other three qualifying wild cards went to British players Emily Appleton, Amarni Banks and Sonay Kartal.

Jack Pinnington Jones, the Most Outstanding Player of TCU's NCAA Team Championship last month, received a qualifying wild card, as did Broom, Jay Clarke, Felix Gill, George Loffhagen and ITF Junior No. 22 Oliver Bonding. Two qualifying wild cards are available via the LTA playoff and there is one additional men's qualifying wild card to be announced.

Some doubles wild cards were also announced, including men's main draw wild cards for Fearnley and Pinnington Jones, and Fery and Broome.

Three of the four No. 1 seeds advanced to the second round with wins today at the USTA Pro Circuit tournaments, with Mitchell Krueger (Tulsa $25K), Victoria Hu (Wichita $25K) and Learner Tien (Rancho Santa Fe $15K) all getting through in straight sets. Krueger defeated Murphy Cassone(Arizona State) 6-4, 6-4, Hu beat lucky loser Mary Boyce Deatherage 6-3, 6-2 and Tien defeated Patrick Maloney(Michigan) 6-2, 6-2. But at the $15,000 women's tournament in Rancho Santa Fe, top seed Amy Zhu(Michigan) was eliminated by UCLA rising junior Anne Lutkemeyer, a qualifier, 6-3, 5-7, 6-2. 

The first round is still in progress in Wichita, which had a rain delay earlier.

2009 US Open champion Juan Martin Del Potro has announced he will be entering the highly competitive tennis academy scene in Florida, with a new venture at the Indian Springs Country Club in Boynton Beach. 

The Del Potro Tennis Academy is expected to open in September. For more on Del Potro's motivation for starting an academy and an update on the injuries that have kept him from competing for the past several years, see this article. 

Watch Trailer for Junior Documentary Top Class Tennis, Debuting Next Month on Amazon; USTA US Open Wild Card Challenge Begins July 1; Mullins Named CEO of ITA; Four USTA Pro Circuit Tournaments This Week

An official announcement from Amazon Prime, along with the trailer below, came today regarding the debut of the junior tennis documentary "Top Class Tennis." This documentary, part of the Uninterrupted series, was filmed at the Eddie Herr and Orange Bowl championships in December 2022, following four junior players: Joseph Oyebog, Ariana Pursoo, Stephanie Yakoff and Stiles Brockett.  The four-part series will air on Amazon Prime's FreeVee, with the first installment set for July 18. 

The USTA announced its annual US Open Wild Card Challenge to distribute one of the main draw US Open wild cards it awards each year. The men will have a six-week window, beginning July 1 and lasting through the week of August 5th, with the four best results at any hard-court, $25K and above, tournament anywhere in the world. The women will have a four-week window, beginning July 15 and also lasting through the week of August 5th, with the three best results at hard-court, W35 and above tournaments, counting in the race. Last year's winners were Steve Johnson and Kayla Day.

The ITA announced its new Chief Executive Officer today, with Dave Mullins, who has been with the ITA since 2019 and has been the Chief Operating Office since 2021, selected by the board to replace Tim Russell, who announced his retirement in January. Mullins and Russell will work together as co-CEOs for the next six months, with Mullins taking over on January 1, 2025.

Four USTA Pro Circuit tournaments are underway this week, with the SoCal Pro Series $15Ks for men and women both in Rancho Santa Fe; a $25K for men is in Tulsa Oklahoma and a W35 for women is in Wichita Kansas. 

Like the men's tournament in Wichita last week, the women's qualifying also had a 64-player draw, with eight players qualifying for the 32-player main draw. Americans advancing through qualifying are Paris Corley(Arizona, LSU), Sydni Ratliff(Ohio State), Jada Robinson, 16-year-old Rachael Smith, Camille Kiss and Malkia Ngounoue. 

Victoria Hu(Princeton) and Akasha Urhobo are the top two seeds. Wild cards were awarded to Amelia Honer(UC-Santa Barbara), Carson Tanguilig(North Carolina), Kate Fakih(UCLA) and Wichita State rising sophomore Giorgia Roselli of Italy.

Oliver Lincer of Poland, the rising UCF sophomore, received a special exemption after winning the W15 in the Dominican Republic; Fiona Crawley(North Carolina), who won the W15 in San Diego last week, has now won three consecutive USTA Pro Circuit tournaments since last fall, and will look to extend her 15-match winning streak as the No. 4 seed this week.

In Tulsa, five Americans advanced to the main draw with wins in the final round of qualifying today: Pierce Rollins (Texas A&M, Tulsa) Aidan Kim (Florida, Ohio State), Gabrielius Guzauskas (Illinois), JC Roddick (UCF, Texas A&M) and Nicolas Kotzen(Columbia).

Mitchell Krueger is the top seed, with Bernard Tomic of Australia seeded No. 2. Wild cards were given to Tyler Zink(Georgia, Oklahoma State), Govind Nanda(UCLA), Jonah Braswell(Florida, Texas) and Chad Kissell(Valparaiso).  Micah Braswell(Texas), the champion last week in Wichita, received a special exemption into the main draw.

In Rancho Santa Fe, four of the eight men's qualifiers were from the United States: Colton Smith(Arizona), Aadarsh Tripathi(UCLA), Ryan Dickerson(Duke, Baylor) and Alexander Petrov(Illinois).

Learner Tien(USC) is the top seed, after taking last week off following his two consecutive titles to start the seven-week SoCal Pro Series. Strong Kirchheimer(Northwestern) is the No. 2 seed. 

Wild cards were given to Ethan Schiffman(Cal), William Kleege, Masato Perera(Harvard) and Trevor Svajda, who is the No. 6 seed. Svajda played Alex Frusina(Auburn), who received entry via the ITF's Junior Reserved program in the first round today, with Svajda posting a 6-3, 6-2 win.

Six Americans advanced to the main draw in the women's tournament in Rancho Santa Fe: Ema Burgic(Baylor), Anne Lutkemeyer(UCLA), Gianna Oboniye(Mississippi State), Bianca Molnar(Notre Dame), Kaila Barksdale(Utah) and Elise Wagle(UCLA). 

Amy Zhu(Michigan) and Sara Daavettila(North Carolina) are the top two seeds. Wild cards were awarded to Maxine Murphy(Washington State), Filippa Bruu-Syversen(San Diego), Katie Codd(Duke) and 15-year-old Julieta Pareja. Fifteen-year-old Thea Frodin received entry via the ITF Junior Reserved program and won her first round match today over Elyse Tse(Washington State) of New Zealand 6-4, 7-5.

Thorat Wins J100 in Mexico; Ashar, Mata, Oak, Plunkett Earn ITF Junior Circuit Titles; Kratzer Among Winners on UTR Pro Tennis Tour

The only J300 tournament last week on the ITF Junior Circuit was on clay, in Bamberg Germany, with juniors not able to play on grass anywhere nearly as much as the pros in the weeks leading up to the Wimbledon Junior Championships. Generally it's just the Roehampton J300 the first week of Wimbledon that affords juniors any experience on the surface, although there are a variety of exhibition and junior team events often organized for the week before Roehampton.

In Bamberg, Mayu Crossley of Japan took the title, with the No. 1 seed going through qualifying in order to participate in the tournament; the UCLA recruit, who has won six of her seven ITF junior titles on clay, including two J500s, defeated 14-year-old Victoria Barros of Brazil, the No. 8 seed, 6-4, 7-5 in the final. Crossley, who did not drop a set all week, had lost in the first round of the Roland Garros Junior Championships this year, where she wasn't seeded, but now has her junior ranking back up to 22.

The boys title in Bamberg went to Germany's Diego Dedura-Palomero, the No. 3 seed, who defeated No. 4 seed Oskari Paldanius of Finland 6-1, 6-2 in the final. It is the seventh ITF Junior Circuit singles title for the 16-year-old, but his first at the J300 level, and he is up to a career-high of 37 in the latest ITF junior rankings.

American juniors collected five ITF Junior Circuit singles titles last week, with University of Florida recruit Abhishek Thorat taking top honors with the singles championship at the J100 in Veracruz Mexico. Thorat, a 17-year-old rising senior, defeated 16-year-old Gavin Goode 6-4, 6-2 in a final between unseeded Americans. It's the third ITF Junior Circuit singles title for Thorat, who did not drop a set in his six victories.

 

Goode and partner Ryan Cozad won the boys doubles title, with the unseeded pair defeating top seeds Ty Host of Australia and Harry Pugh of New Zealand 6-2, 6-4 in the final. Goode and Cozad dropped just one set, to the No. 2 seeds, in their five victories.

Unseeded Maria Aytoyan reached the girls singles final, losing to top seed Emma Dong of Canada 6-2, 7-6(5).

At the J60 in Guatemala, 16-year-old Floridian Ishika Ashar, the No. 5 seed, collected her second ITF Junior Circuit singles title, both coming this year. Ashar defeated unseeded Ireland O'Brien 6-4, 6-1, taking the title without dropping a set.  

Isabelle DeLuccia and Hadley Appling, the No. 4 seeds, won the all-US girls doubles final, beating the unseeded team of O'Brien and Sophia Budacsek 6-3, 6-0. Top seeds Zavier Augustin and Omar Rhazali won the boys doubles title, beating No. 2 seeds Lev Seidman and France's Sasha Colleu 6-1, 6-1 in the final.

Thirteen-year-old Te'anna Mata won her second straight J30 girls singles title in Congo, again taking out Anna Hsu of Taiwan in the final. Two weeks ago, Hsu was the No. 2 seed; last week she was No. 1, with the unseeded Mata posting another straight-sets victory, this one by a 6-2, 6-3 score. Mata also reached the girls doubles final last week.

At the J30 in Ottawa Canada, 16-year-old Connor Plunkett of New York swept the titles, winning his first singles title on the ITF Junior Circuit and his second doubles title. Plunkett defeated the top seed in the first round and didn't lose a set after that, getting the title when unseeded Arjun Prabhakar of the US retired trailing 3-1 in the first set.  Plunkett and Victor Maya of Canada took the doubles title, with the unseeded pair defeating No. 3 seeds Caden Colburne and Andy Kepche of Canada 6-2, 2-6, 10-7 in the final.

Sixteen-year-old Sobee Oak claimed her first ITF Junior Circuit title in Ottawa, with the unseeded New Yorker defeating unseeded Kaya Moe 7-5, 6-7(4), 6-4 in another all-US singles final. Moe did win the doubles title, with partner Olivia Cutone; the No. 4 seeds defeated No. 3 seeds Oak and Canada's Neda Rahimkhani 6-4, 6-3 in the final.

And somehow I missed the girls singles title two weeks ago at the J60 in South Africa for Koronayashe Rugara. The 16-year-old Rugara, seeded No. 6, defeated top seed Danielle Dai Chapman of South Africa 2-6, 7-6(6), 6-4 in the final for her first ITF Junior Circuit title. 

The latest results for the UTR Pro Tennis Tour tournaments in the United States are below. There have been less than two tournaments per month in the April, May and June, but the pace does pick up in the next six months, with 14 men's and 11 women's tournaments already scheduled for July-December. 

2017 USTA National 18s champion Ashley Kratzer has returned to competitive tennis after a four-year ban for testing positive for a banned substance in March of 2020. Kratzer, who reached a WTA career-high of 200 in August of 2018, last played on the Pro Circuit in January of 2020, where she lost in qualifying at a WTA 125 in Newport Beach California.

WOMEN:

April 15 San Antonio TX

Victoria Rodriguez d. Ana Sofia Sanchez 6-1, 6-3

April 21 Boca Raton FL

Malkia Ngounoue d. Jada Robinson 6-1, 5-7, 6-4

May 13 Newport Beach CA

Ashley Kratzer d. Carolyn Campana 6-2, 6-4

June 10 Charleston SC

Piper Charney d. Kaitlyn Carnicella 4-6, 7-6(5), 6-3

MEN:

April 15 San Antonio TX

Trey Hilderbrand d. Osgar O'Hoisin 6-4, 6-4

April 28 Boca Raton FL

Alex Kuperstein d. Dian Nedev 7-5, 6-4

May 20 Newport Beach CA

Lui Maxted d. Duncan Chan 5-7, 6-2, 6-2

June 10 Charleston SC

Landon Ardila d. Lucas Brown 7-5, 6-3

Braswell and Fearnley's Smooth Transition to Professional Titles; Rajecki Qualifies for WTA 250, Meets Familiar Face in First Round; Crawley and Tarvet Earn Titles in SoCal Pro Series $15Ks in San Diego

Four weeks ago today, University of Texas senior Micah Braswell and TCU fifth-year Jake Fearnley played each other in the NCAA Team Championships. Braswell won that match at line 2 4-6, 6-3, 6-1, although Fearnley's team did claim the title with a 4-3 victory overall. Both lost in the round of 16 of the NCAA singles championship, Braswell to eventual champion Filip Planinsek of Alabama, Fearnley to eventual finalist Michael Zheng of Columbia, but have now begun their pro careers with titles after qualifying for events this week.

Braswell defeated teammate Eliot Spizzirri 6-4, 6-3 in today's championship match of the $25,000 USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Wichita Kansas, capturing his second Pro Circuit title after winning a $25K in Austin in 2022. As impressive as the week was for the 22-year-old from Florida, Fearnley outdid him on the grass courts of Nottingham, winning the ATP Challenger 125 there today when he had not earned a victory on the Challenger Tour prior to this week.

The 22-year-old from Scotland had to play two matches today, beating Mattia Bellucci of Italy 6-3, 6-1 in the semifinals, then downing fellow qualifier Charlie Broom(Dartmouth, Baylor) 4-6, 6-4, 6-3. Fearnley, who won a $25K to start 2024, before returning to Fort Worth for the dual match season, will improve his ATP ranking from 525 to 274, putting him in good position for US Open qualifying with any additional success this summer. It also marks him as a likely candidate for a Wimbledon main draw wild card, with the bulk of those expected to be announced Wednesday.

After posting her first WTA Top 100 victory yesterday in the first round of qualifying at the WTA 250 in Birmingham, NC State graduate Amelia Rajecki earned another one today to qualify for the main draw. The 22-year-old from Nottingham, who was named ITA Senior Player of the Year last week, defeated WTA No. 77 Katie Volynets 6-3, 6-7(5), 6-4, coming from 4-0 down in the third set to earn a place in the main draw of a WTA tournament for the first time. 

Despite the fact that Rajecki is making her WTA main draw debut, she'll know plenty about the game of her first round opponent: Diana Shnaider. Currently 48 in the WTA rankings, Shnaider, who played No. 1 for the Wolfpack last year while Rajecki was playing at line 3, was inside the WTA Top 100 most of her time in Raleigh. For more on Rajecki's win, see this article from the LTA.

At the SoCal Pro Series $15,000 tournaments at the University of San Diego, top seed Fiona Crawley(North Carolina) and No. 8 seed Oliver Tarvet(San Diego) of Great Britain emerged this afternoon as the champions.

In the women's final, Crawley, a 22-year-old from Texas, beat No. 6 seed Sara Daavettila, a former teammate of Crawley's at UNC, 6-4, 1-6, 6-3 for her third USTA Pro Circuit title. 

Tarvet, a rising junior at San Diego, defeated unseeded Nathan Ponwith(Georgia, Arizona State) 6-4, 3-6, 6-4 in a three-hour-plus men's final. It's the third Pro Circuit title for the 20-year-old Tarvet.

It was another big week for $15K titles for current/recent collegians in tournaments all over the world, with three picking up their first career singles titles on the Pro Circuit.

Illinois rising senior Karlis Ozolins of Latvia won his first ITF men's World Tennis Tour singles title at a $15,000 tournament in Korea.

Mississippi State rising junior Petar Jovanovic of Montenegro won his first title on the ITF men's WTT as qualifier, winning eight matches at a $15,000 tournament in Serbia.

Central Florida rising sophomore Olivia Lincer of Poland won her first ITF women's World Tennis Tour title at a $15,000 tournament in the Dominican Republic, beating Cal rising senior Katja Wiersholm 7-6(4), 6-1 in the final.

Recent Pepperdine graduate Janice Tjen won her second straight W15 in Tunisia.

And in non-college titles of note, 18-year-old Kaitlin Quevedo of Naples Florida, now representing Spain, won her sixth title, and her third this year, at a W15 in Madrid. 

Longhorns Spizzirri and Braswell Meet for Wichita $25K Title; Two Tar Heels Reach San Diego W15 Final; British Collegians Earn ATP/WTA Top 100 Wins on Grass; Knight and Lorimer Earn Entry into Wimbledon U14 Tournament

The USTA Pro Circuit $25,000 men's title will be an all-Texas contest Sunday, with Eliot Spizzirri and qualifier Micah Braswell meeting for the championship in Wichita Kansas after straight-sets victories in today's semifinals.

Braswell defeated fellow qualifier Sebastian Gorzny 6-2, 7-6(5) after Gorzny, who recently announced his transfer from TCU to Texas, served twice for the second set, but couldn't force a third. Braswell, who won his sole Pro Circuit title in November of 2022, played  at line 2 for Texas all year, behind Spizzirri, who won his only Pro Circuit title back in 2021. Then unseeded Spizzirri, who finished the 2023-24 college season at No. 1 in the nation, defeated 2023 NCAA champion Ethan Quinn(Georgia) 6-3, 6-3 in today's other semifinal. 

Spizzirri and Braswell will meet for the first time on the Pro Circuit in Sunday's final.

In the doubles final today, No. 2 seeds Joshua Sheehy(Abilene Christian) and Pranav Kumar(SMU, Texas A&M) defeated  the unseeded team of Spizzirri and Canada's Cleeve Harper 6-7(4), 6-3, 10-8 for their first Pro Circuit title as a team. Spizzirri and Harper reached the NCAA doubles final last year, and the semifinals this year. 

At the women's W15 in San Diego, former North Carolina stars Fiona Crawley and Sara Daavettila will play for the title Sunday. Crawley, the top seed, defeated No. 5 seed Eryn Cayetano(USC) 6-2, 6-2, while Daavettila, who won last week's W15 in San Diego,  broke open a tight match late in the second set to defeat 17-year-old Alyssa Ahn 3-6, 6-4, 6-1 in just under three hours.

The 22-year-old Crawley and the 26-year-old Daavettlia, who played together on the 2020-2021 North Carolina team, have not faced in other on the Pro Circuit.

In the women's doubles final today, unseeded Anita Sahdiieva(Baylor, LSU) of Ukraine and Basak Eryadin of Turkey defeated sisters Anna Campana(Wake Forest, Pepperdine) and Carolyn Campana(Wake Forest, Vanderbilt, Pepperdine) 0-6, 6-3, 10-8. 

The men's final at the $15,000 SoCal Pro Series tournament in San Diego will feature University of San Diego star Oliver Tarvet of Great Britain and Nathan Ponwith(Georgia, Arizona State). USD rising junior Tarvet, the No. 8 seed, defeated No. 2 seed Strong Kirchheimer(Northwestern) 6-3, 6-3; the unseeded Ponwith defeated Patrick Maloney(Michigan), also unseeded, 4-6, 6-3, 6-2.

In the doubles final this evening, Ponwith and JJ Tracy(Ohio State), defeated Wally Thane(Utah, BYU) and Estonia's Johannes Seeman(San Diego State) 7-6(2), 6-2 in a contest between unseeded teams.

British players of any age traditionally excel on grass and this week's results have done nothing to dispel that maxim, with three former collegians getting their first ATP/WTA Top 100 wins  despite the many rain delays that also go with that surface.

Recent NC State graduate Amelia Rajecki, who reached the semifinals of the NCAA singles championships in 2023 and 2024, received a wild card into the qualifying of the WTA 250 in Birmingham, and the 22-year-old from Nottingham made good use of it today, beating WTA No. 72 Yafan Wang of China 7-6(5), 7-6(6). Rajecki, 794 in the WTA rankings, will face WTA No. 77 Katie Volynets, the 2019 USTA girls 18s champion, for a spot in the main draw.

Recent TCU graduate Jake Fearnley has had a banner week at the ATP Challenger 125 in Nottingham. Fearnley, a 22-year-old from Scotland, qualified for the main draw, then won the first Challenger match, and now is in the semifinals, after earning his first ATP Top 100 win today. Fearnley defeated No. 3 seed Jerry Shang of China 7-5, 7-5 and will try to continue his winning streak against Mattia Bellucci of Italy. Bellucci defeated Fearnley's TCU teammate Jack Pinnington Jones 6-4, 7-6(0) today; Pinnington Jones had gotten his first ATP Top 100 win with a 1-6, 6-4, 6-4 win over top seed and former Horned Frog Cam Norrie in the second round. 

Another British qualifer, Charlie Broom(Dartmouth, Baylor), also posted his best wins this week, advancing to the semifinals in Nottingham with wins over Lloyd Harris of South Africa in the second round and today, a 3-6, 6-3, 6-2 victory over No. 2 seed and ATP No. 62 Dan Evans of Great Britain. Broom, 26, will face Billy Harris of Great Britain in his first Challenger semifinal Sunday.

The grass season has also begun for younger players, with a Tennis Europe Category 1 tournament, which serves as a qualifying event for the Wimbledon U14 tournament, concluding today in London. The tournament, open to all Tennis Europe players, ended with two all-British finals. No. 7 seed Megan Knight, the 2023 Junior Orange Bowl 12s finalist, defeated No. 3 seed Daniella Britton 6-4, 7-5 to secure her place in the 16-player tournament contested on the final four days of Wimbledon. Eric Lorimer, the top seed, defeated No. 4 seed Niall Pickerd-Barua 6-4, 6-3 in the boys final. Complete draws for this week's event are here. 

I hope to have the names of the two US girls and two US boys who will be competing in the third edition of the Wimbledon U14 event soon.

Quinn, Three Longhorns Advance to Wichita $25K Semifinals; Ahn Reaches First Pro Circuit Semifinal in San Diego; Becker Returns to College Tennis, Florida Announces New Assistant Coaches

The semifinals at this week's $25,000 men's USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Wichita Kansas feature some of best-known names in Division I college tennis the past two years, with only one of them, No. 2 Ethan Quinn, seeded. 

Quinn, the 2023 NCAA champion as a redshirt freshman at Georgia, defeated qualifier Alex Kotzen(Columbia, Tennessee) 3-6, 6-1, 6-2, and he was the sole semifinalist to finish his quarterfinal in less than two hours.  Quinn's opponent in Saturday's semifinals will be two-time ITA Player of the Year Eliot Spizzirri of Texas, who concluded his collegiate career last month in Stillwater Oklahoma. Spizzirri came from 3-1 down in the third set against No. 8 seed Filip Peliwo of Poland, winning the last five games of the three-hour match 4-6, 7-5, 6-3. Spizzirri and Quinn haven't played on the Pro Circuit, but met three times in college in the 2022-23 season, with Quinn winning twice.

Spizzirri's teammate Micah Braswell, who also completed his eligibility last month in Stillwater, advanced to the semifinals with a 2-6, 6-4, 6-1 win over No. 3 seed Liam Draxl of Canada, the 2021 ITA Player of the Year at Kentucky. That quarterfinal clocked in at three hours and nine minutes. 

Braswell's opponent in the semifinals is fellow qualifier Sebastian Gorzny, who announced his transfer from TCU to Texas last month. Gorzny, who also reached the Wichita semifinals last year, defeated top seed Bernard Tomic of Australia 6-1, 6-3 in the second round last night, and today got the better of now former teammate Lui Maxted of Great Britain, also a qualifier, 6-3, 4-6, 6-3 in two hours and 34 minutes.  Braswell and Gorzny played in the second round of a $25K in Austin back in November of 2022, with Braswell winning 6-3, 6-3; Braswell went on to claim that title, his first and only to date.

The joint SoCal Pro Series events at the University of San Diego, both $15Ks, are also packed with college players in the final four. Recent North Carolina graduate Fiona Crawley, the No. 1 seed in the women's draw, is through to the semifinals, beating No. 7 seed Basak Eryadin of Turkey 2-6, 6-2, 6-4. She will face recent USC graduate Eryn Cayetano, the No. 5 seed, who beat UCLA rising junior Anne Christine Lutkemeyer 6-4, 6-2. Last week's San Diego champion and No. 6 seed Sara Daavettila, the former North Carolina All-American, defeated No. 2 seed Haley Giavara(Cal) 7-6(5), 3-6, 6-0 to set up a meeting with 17-year-old San Diego resident Alyssa Ahn. Ahn, a rising high school senior, is through to her first Pro Circuit semifinal, beating No. 3 seed Hong Yi Cody Wong of Hong Kong 3-6, 6-1, 6-4 in a two-hour and 51 minute battle. Ahn, who played five of the SoCal Pro Series tournaments last year, going 4-5, is the 2022 USTA National 16s champion. 

The men's draw in San Diego features the only non-American to make the semifinals in this week's USTA Pro Circuit events: University of San Diego's All-American Oliver Tarvet of Great Britain. Tarvet, a rising junior, defeated fellow 20-year-old Jay Friend(Arizona) of Japan 6-2, 7-6(7). No. 8 seed Tarvet will play No. 2 seed Strong Kirchheimer(Northwestern), who beat Collin Altimirano(Virginia) 6-0, 6-4.  

Patrick Maloney(Michigan) defeated No. 3 seed Alafia Ayeni(Cornell, Kentucky) 7-6(5), 7-5 and will play Nathan Ponwith(Georgia, Arizona State), who beat Derek Pham(Oklahoma State) of Australia 6-7(6), 6-1, 7-5 in three hours and five minutes.

The head coaching carousel has slowed as far as head coaching positions go, but there continues to be news on the assistant front. 

After one year out of college tennis, Benjamin Becker, the former Baylor All-American and ATP No. 35, is returning as the associate head coach at the University of Texas. Becker, who was Michigan's associate head coach under Adam Steinberg from 2018-2023 takes over for Ryan Lipman, who is leaving college tennis and returning to Nashville.

Florida has two new men's assistants, with Adam Steinberg naming Anthony Rossi associate head coach. Rossi, who was the men's head coach at Virginia Commonwealth for the past six years. Rossi replaces Matt Cloer, who is returning to the USTA as a National Coach. Max Koller, who was a men's assistant coach at Oklahoma State last season, is the second Florida assistant recently hired.

The Texas A&M women have a new associate head coach in former Georgia State men's coach James Wilson. Wilson, who also coached at Utah State and South Florida, is replacing Jordan Szabo, who is the new head coach at Auburn.

TCU's Roditi and Tennessee's Ojeda Named ITA Coaches of the Year; Women's Kickoff Weekend Draft Complete; Wimbledon Junior Acceptances Include Svajda and Urhobo

The ITA Division I National Awards, which for many years were announced prior to the finals of the NCAA Team Championships, are on a different schedule now, with the ITA Regional Awards announced yesterday and the National Awards today. Below are the winners; while Texas's Eliot Spirzzirri and Texas A&M's Mary Stoiana didn't received any Regional awards, they are the National Players of the Year after finishing the season at No. 1 in the rankings. Congratulations to all coaches and players who earned acknowledgement of their great seasons.

ITA Division I National Awards

MEN:
Wilson Coach of the Year: David Roditi, TCU

Assistant Coach of the Year: Devin Bowen, TCU
Arthur Ashe Leadership & Sportsmanship: Alex Kiefer, Virginia
Rafael Osuna Sportsmanship: Ryan Fishback, Virginia Tech
Rookie of the Year: Cooper Williams, Harvard
Most Improved Player: Jake Fearnley, TCU
Player to Watch: Michael Zheng, Columbia
Senior Player of the Year: Micah Braswell, Texas
National Player of the Year: Eliot Spizzirri, Texas

WOMEN:
Wilson Coach of the Year: Alison Ojeda, Tennessee

Assistant Coach of the Year: Jarryd Chaplin, Georgia
Arthur Ashe Leadership & Sportsmanship: Connie Ma, Stanford
Cissie Leary Sportsmanship: Carol Lee, Georgia Tech
Rookie of the Year: Luciana Perry, Ohio State
Most Improved Player: Ange Oby Kajuru, Oklahoma State
Player to Watch: Amelia Honer, UC Santa Barbara
Senior Player of the Year: Amelia Rajecki, NC State
National Player of the Year: Mary Stoiana, Texas A&M

THe women's ITA Kickoff Weekend Draft was held today, with 42 teams choosing which of the 14 regional host sites they will travel to for the January 2025 regional competition that will determine the ITA National Team Indoor participants. 

As with the men's draft yesterday, the first regional to fill was Tennessee; the last to fill was Charlottesville, with Virginia hosting the final team in the field, No. 66 New Mexico. Texas A&M was the last site to be selected. In addition to Tennessee, the other two regionals to fill early, with all four teams among the Top 35, are Florida and North Carolina.

Three teams passed, as compared to the six men's teams that elected not to play the event: Notre Dame, Syracuse and Purdue. Northwestern and Illinois will be the cohosts of the Women's Team Indoor in February and therefore receive automatic entry. See the SLAM tennis draft page for the breakdown of each regional.

The acceptances for next month's Wimbledon Junior Championships, which I will be covering in person again this year, are out, with six US girls and eight US boys on the initial list of main draw acceptances. 

Every girl in the Top 10 of the ITF junior rankings has entered, including Australian Open girls champion Renata Jamrichova of Slovakia and Roland Garros girls champion Tereza Valentova of the Czech Republic. The US girls entered in main draw are Tyra Grant, Iva Jovic, Kristina Penickova, Kaitlyn Rolls, Thea Frodin and Akasha Urhobo. Urhobo received entry based on her Top 400 WTA ranking, with the 17-year-old from Florida having one of the best World Tennis Numbers in the field.  

Texas rising freshman Maya Joint of Australia, who is in the Wimbledon women's qualifying, has also entered the Junior Championships. Although she received entry based on her junior ranking, she will be seeded in junior event due to her WTA ranking, which is now 177.

The main draw cutoff was 50. Five US girls received entry into the qualifying, which had a cutoff of 84: Shannon Lam, Kate Fakih, Christasha McNeil, Monika Ekstrand and Maya Iyengar.

The boys field is missing two Top 10 players: No. 2 Joel Schwaerzler of Austria and No. 7 Joao Fonseca of Brazil, who is no longer competing in juniors. But aside from those two, every boy in the Top 23 has entered, including Roland Garros champion Kaylan Bigun and Australian Open champion Rei Sakamoto of Japan. The US boys on the main draw acceptance list are: Bigun, Cooper Woestendick, Jagger Leach, Max Exsted, Ian Mayew, Alex Razeghi, Jack Kennedy and Trevor Svajda. Like Urhobo, Svajda received entry based on his professional ranking. Boys inside the ATP 750 (Svajda is currently 662) received direct acceptance into the main draw of a junior slam. SMU rising sophomore Svajda currently has the best World Tennis Number of any player on the acceptance list. Mae Malige of France also received entry, as he did at Roland Garros, based on his ATP ranking inside the Top 750. He is at 718 in the ATP rankings right now. I don't remember a junior slam that had an acceptance for both a boy and a girl from the US based on their professional ranking. 

The boys main draw cutoff was 47. Five US boys were accepted into qualifying: Matthew Forbes, Kase Schinnerer, Nikita Filin, Noah Johnston and Rudy Quan.

Quan received entry into the qualifying based on his ATP ranking, which rose to 847 after his run to the quarterfinals of the Little Rock Challenger last month. Any boy with an ATP ranking between 750 and 850 is accepted into qualifying at a junior slam.

The cutoff for qualifying for the boys was 74.

USTA Announces Summer Collegiate Team; Men's Kick-off Weekend Draft Complete; Ohio State Adds Transfers Li, Kim and Jansen; ITA D-I Regional Awards; Krajicek Endows Scholarship at Texas A&M

The USTA announced the Summer Collegiate Team today, with six American men and six American women chosen for support during competition this summer on the USTA Pro Circuit. With the exception of Perry and Williams, who ended the year as the top-ranked freshmen, and UNC's Fiona Crawley, who had so much success as a member of the team in 2023, these are the Americans with the best ITA season-ending rankings.

Women:
*Fiona Crawley, UNC (Sr.; San Antonio)
Connie Ma, Stanford (Jr.; Dublin, Calif.)
Kari Miller, Michigan (Sr.; Ann Arbor, Mich.)
Alexa Noel, Miami (Jr.; Summit, N.J.)
Luciana Perry, Ohio State (Fr.; Export, Pa.)
*Mary Stoiana, Texas A&M (Jr.; Southbury, Conn.)

Men:
Ozan Baris, Michigan State (Soph.; Okemos, Mich.)
​*Nishesh Basavareddy, Stanford (Soph.; Carmel, Ind.)
Micah Braswell, Texas (Sr.; Sarasota, Fla.)
*Eliot Spizzirri, Texas (Sr.; Greenwich, Conn.)
Cooper Williams, Duke (Fr.; New York)
Michael Zheng, Columbia (Soph.; Montville, N.J.)

​*members of 2023 Summer Collegiate teams

From today's USTA release:

Each of the players was selected based on a number of criteria, including rankings, individual collegiate tournament results or Intercollegiate Tennis Association honors. Players on the team are eligible to receive a grant for travel to USTA Pro Circuit events and coaching support over the summer.

Oklahoma State Assistant Coaches Martin Redlicki and Samantha Crawford will travel with and coach the men and the women, respectively, and will provide assistance to any American collegians playing at tournaments throughout the summer. The program is led by USTA National Coach Maureen Diaz.

“As the level of training and competition in college tennis continues to rise in the U.S. and become an increasingly more important and viable pathway for our best American prospects to mature and develop before they enter the professional ranks, our USTA PD commitment to our top collegians is also strong and comprehensive,” said USTA Player Development GM Martin Blackman. “We commend the ITA for working closely with the ATP and WTA to establish important and powerful linkages for top collegians into professional tennis events. We look forward to seeing this year's Summer Team compete, perform and progress during a robust and exciting summer of great USTA Pro Circuit events throughout the U.S. Congratulations also to the coaches from these great universities for their success in developing these great young players.”

The ITA Men's Kickoff Weekend Draft was held today, with 42 teams selecting which one of the 14 regional host sites where they wish to compete in the January 2025 event. Given the unique nature of the draft, which allows a team to select a regional that it prefers based on competitive or travel considerations, reading the tea leaves is irresistible, although there is no question this is way too early to make a prediction on the strength of a host (or other teams in the region).

The first regional to fill was Tennessee; the last to fill was Columbia, who will host Miami, who at a ranking of 64, was the last team to draft. The last regional to get a No. 2 seed was Ohio State; Tennessee had its regional full before No. 36 Princeton chose Columbus. In addition to Tennessee, Harvard and Mississippi State were popular destinations for top seeds. No. 10 Florida State quickly got its No. 2 and No. 3 seeds in No. 15 South Carolina and No. 19 San Diego, but their fourth seed was one of the last teams to draft: No. 60 UNC-Wilmington.

Six teams passed: Florida Atlantic,  Notre Dame, Utah State, Penn, Clemson and Cal. SMU and Baylor receive direct entry into the 16-team Men's ITA National Team Indoor Championships as co-hosts.

See SLAM tennis for the full regional lineups. The women's draft is Thursday at noon Eastern, with the SLAM tennis page to follow it is here.

The Ohio State men, who lost four of its top six, announced three significant transfers today: rising sophomore Aidan Kim from Florida, rising junior Will Jansen from North Carolina and rising senior Chris Li from Tennessee(previously North Carolina).  With the NCAA no longer involved in the transfer process, signings like these are likely to become an even bigger part of building rosters each summer. 

The ITA announced its Regional Award winners today; the National Award winners will be announced on Thursday. For all the Regional winners, see the ITF pages for men and women. Interesting that Eliot Spizzirri of Texas and Mary Stoiana of Texas A&M, both of whom finished ranked No. 1 in the nation, did not receive any of the Texas Region's awards. I will list all the National winners in my post Thursday.

Former Texas A&M All-American Austin Krajicek, a former ATP World No. 1 in doubles and now ranked No. 14, won the NCAA doubles title in 2011 with Jeff Dadamo and reached the ATP Top 100 in singles before focusing solely on his doubles career. T

The 33-year-old from Florida, who now lives in Texas, was married recently and his wife, the former Misia Kedzierski, who played at Illinois, is a graduate of the Texas A&M Mays business school. Earlier this year, the couple announced an endowment for a marketing scholarship at Mays for students, who like Kedzierski, are not from Texas. As this quote from Misia in the Texas A&M Today article explains, "The scholarship will support out-of-state marketing graduate students because Texas A&M offers such a great college experience. We thought more people from around the country should know about Aggieland and experience its culture like we did while having fun being an Aggie." 

Three USTA Pro Circuit Tournaments Underway, with Quinn Defending Wichita $25K Title; Men's ITA Kickoff Weekend Draft Wednesday; Lipka Named Men's Head Coach at Penn State; ACC Women's Conference Awards

The USTA Pro Circuit has three events this week, with another joint SoCal Pro Series tournament in San Diego, this one at the University of San Diego, not Barnes Tennis Center, and a $25K in Wichita Kansas.

Due to a delay today, I assume weather-related, the San Diego matches are still going on, and final round qualifying results have not been posted. 

In the women's $15,000 tournament in San Diego, Fiona Crawley(North Carolina) is the top seed, with Haley Giavara(Cal) the No. 2 seed. 

Wild cards were given to rising high school junior Alexandra Wolf, Easter Bowl 18s champion Tianmei Wang, Anne Christine Lutkemeyer(UCLA) and rising San Diego senior Filippa Bruu-Syversen. 

In the men's $15,000 tournament in San Diego, Leo Borg of Sweden in the top seed, with Strong Kirchheimer(Northwestern) the No. 2 seed. Wild cards were given to rising high school sophomore Tyler Lee, who lost 6-1, 6-3 in the first round to Jack Anthrop(Ohio State), Anders Matta(Stanford), Blake Kasday(San Diego) and Bryce Nakashima(Ohio State). Nikita Filin received entry via the ITF's junior reserved program for players in the Top 100.

At the $25,000 USTA Men's Pro Circuit tournament in Wichita Kansas, qualifying concluded today, with six Americans, all current or former collegians reaching the main draw.

Alex Kotzen(Columbia,Tennessee), Sebastian Gorzny(TCU, Texas), Micah Braswell(Texas), Nick Kotzen(Columbia), Tyler Zink(Georgia, Oklahoma State) and Chad Kissell(Valparaiso). This tournament had a rare 48-player draw in qualifying for a 32-player main draw; Nick Kotzen, who wasn't seeded in qualifying, had to win three matches to advance to the main draw, and he will play his older brother Alex in the first round.

Australian Bernard Tomic, presumably recovered from his bout with Covid during the Little Rock Challenger, is the top seed, with Ethan Quinn(Georgia), the defending champion at this event, seeded No. 2. 

Wild cards were given to Govind Nanda(UCLA), Aidan Kim(Florida), Samir Banerjee(Stanford) and Alejandro Jacome Jaramillo(Wichita State) of Ecuador. Adhithya Ganesan(Florida) received entry via the ATP ITF Junior Accelerator Program; his 2023 year-end ranking of 27 qualifies him for eight main draw acceptances for $15K or $25K tournaments.

All 16 first round matches are scheduled for Wednesday.

The NCAA tournament ended barely two weeks ago, but preparation for next season's ITA National Team Indoor Championships begin tomorrow, with the Kickoff Weekend Draft for men. Next year, with SMU and Baylor co-hosts of the men's Team Indoor, the top 14 teams in last month's final rankings will host the January regionals that will decide who competes for the National Team Indoor Title in February. The draft, which begins at 9 a.m. (Pacific time) Wednesday with No. 15 South Carolina selecting which host it wants to travel to, can be monitored at the Slam tennis page.

The women's draft is Thursday, with Northwestern and Illinois, the dual hosts next February, getting direct entry into the 16-team field. The women's draft page is here.

Penn State announced its new head coach, with Bruce Lipka selected to lead the Nittany Lions' men's program. Lipka is taking over for Jeff Zinn, announced his retirement in April. The director of tennis at Woodmont Country Club in Maryland the past 24 years, Lipka was the head coach at Miami of Ohio from 1989-1996.

The last of the conference awards were finally released, with the ACC women announcing theirs last week, more than a month after the other conferences, including the ACC men. 

Player of the Year: Alexa Noel, Miami

Coach of the Year: Sara O'Leary, Virginia

Freshman of the Year: Savit Kimchin, Duke

For all complete list of all the conference award winners, click here.

Bigun Moves to No. 1 in ITF Junior Rankings; ITF Junior Circuit Titles for Murray, Traynor and Mata; Chinlund and Delgado Claim ITF M15 Doubles Title; Update on Junior Tennis Documentary; NCAA Singles Finals Videos

Kaylan Bigun not only won the Roland Garros boys singles title Saturday, but when the latest ITF Junior Circuit rankings were released today, the 18-year-old Californian had risen to the top spot, from the No. 6 position he occupied after winning the ITF J500 in Milan.

Bigun bumped previous No. 1, Australian Open champion Rei Sakamoto of Japan down to No. 3, with Austria's Joel Schwaerzler, who had been No. 1 for most of the year, remaining at No. 2 after reaching the semifinals in singles and winning the doubles. 

The outstanding Roland Garros results from Tyra Grant, Iva Jovic and Kristina Penickova put all three in the Top 10. Grant stayed at No. 5 with her singles semifinal and doubles final, while Jovic, with a quarterfinal in singles and the doubles final, moved to a career-high of 7. Kristina Penickova, a semifinalist in singles, moved to her career-high of 10 from 25 a week earlier.

Australian Open champion Renata Jamrichova of Slovakia retained the top spot in the girls rankings, with a quarterfinal in singles and the doubles title. Singles and doubles champion Tereza Valentova of the Czech Republic is up to a career-high of No. 4.

In addition to Bigun's Roland Garros title, there were three other Americans who collected singles titles on the ITF Junior Circuit last week.

Sixteen-year-old Ligaya Murray won the J100 in Guatemala, with the No. 3 seed defeating No. 4 seed Valentina Vargas of Ecuador 6-3, 6-4 in the final. It's Murray's second and biggest ITF singles title.  Unseeded Maria Araoz-Gosn and Isabelle DeLuccia won the doubles title, beating No. 3 seeds Marianne Angel of Mexico and Carlota Balseiro of Guatemala 6-3, 6-4 in the final. Zavier Augustin reached the boys singles and doubles final, losing to top seed Cesar Cruz of El Salvador 6-3, 7-6(4) in the singles final.

Sixteen-year-old Olivia Traynor was unseeded at the J60 in Canada, but dropped only one set all week, while beating the top two seeds in the semifinals and finals. Traynor defeated No. 1 seed Anna Tabunshchyk of Canada 6-3, 6-0 in the championship match.

Thirteen-year-old Te'anna Mata, playing in her first ITF Junior Circuit tournament, won the title at the J30 in Congo, which had only 11 participants in the singles draw. Mata didn't lose a set in her three wins, beating No. 2 seed Ann Hsu of Taiwan 7-5, 6-1 in the final.

At the J30 in Uganda, 17-year-old Neha Krishnan won her sixth doubles title of the year, all in Africa, and her second with Saina Jayesh Vaidya of Singapore. The top seeds defeated Saumya Chatterjee of India and Chiu Kwan Nina Wang of Hong Kong 6-3, 6-4 in the final.

Last night at the ITF men's World Tennis Tour $15K in the Dominican Republic, 2023 Easter Bowl champion Cassius Chinlund won his first Pro Circuit doubles title, partnering with Wake Forest rising freshman Andrew Delgado. Left-handers Chinlund, 17, and Delgado, 19, defeated Lorenzo Claverie of Italy and Lucca Pignaton of Brazil 3-6, 7-6(4), 11-9 in the final. It's also the first Pro Circuit doubles title for Delgado, who won the Orange Bowl doubles championship in December with Matthew Forbes.

Ariana Pursoo being filmed for documentary in 2022

The documentary that was the subject of much speculation during its filming at the 2022 Eddie Herr and Orange Bowl appears to be near a debut on Amazon Prime, although nothing official has been announced. Here's the information the Hollywood Reporter recently provided; I wasn't aware until reading this article that Sloane Stephens was involved as an executive producer.

With Roland Garros occupying my time for the past two weeks I'm just now getting everything organized from the NCAAs, and I just finished processing the videos from the singles finals, which appear below. 

Former Collegians Win All Four USTA Pro Circuit Titles Sunday; Gauff Captures Women's Doubles Title at Roland Garros

Although the NCAA tournaments have concluded, former collegians continue to dominate the headlines, with four players with college ties claiming singles titles today on the USTA Pro Circuit.

Carson Branstine, who is the most recent college competitor, won the biggest title of her career today at the women's W75 in Sumter South Carolina, beating Sophie Chang 6-7(6), 7-6(6), 6-1 in a two-hour and 40-minute battle between unseeded players. The 23-year-old Branstine, who had reached finals in her two most recent ITF W35 tournaments in February and April, returned to Texas A&M for the SEC tournament and NCAA team championships, and playing at the No. 1 or No. 2 position, provided the boost the Aggies needed to claim their first NCAA team title last month in Stillwater. 

Branstine, who reached a career-high of 4 on the ITF Junior Circuit in 2017, the year she changed her representation from the United States to Canada, is now inside the WTA Top 350 after this title. It's her second title this year and the fifth of her career on the ITF women's World Tennis Tour.

At the ATP Challenger 75 in Tyler Texas, James Trotter of Japan won his first Challenger singles title, with the former Ohio State Buckeye defeating Brandon Holt(USC) 6-2, 7-6(3) this afternoon. The 2022 NCAA doubles champion, who won his fifth Challenger doubles title Saturday night, won all three of the tiebreakers he contested during the hot and humid week. Yet with all the challenges of playing singles and doubles in difficult conditions, he managed to play his best tennis in his first singles final; he did not face a break point in today's match and won 29 of 31 points when he made a first serve.

Trotter will make a huge jump in the ATP rankings with this title, going from 371 to 274 in the live rankings.

The SoCal Pro Series $15,000 tournaments in San Diego also produced former collegiate champions. Eighteen-year-old Learner Tien, who played a half of a semester at USC last year, won his second consecutive men's title at the Barnes Tennis Center this afternoon. The top-seeded Tien, the two-time Kalamazoo 18s champion who returned last week after several months out with injury, defeated No. 2 seed Alafia Ayeni(Cornell, Kentucky) 6-4, 6-7(5), 6-4 for his fifth USTA Pro Circuit singles title, all coming in the past 11 months. Tien should be around 375 in the ATP rankings when these 15 points are added a week from Monday. Needing matches in his return from injury, Tien got them, winning a 10 singles matches he played, and he is not entered in either the $25K in Wichita or in the third $15K in San Diego next week.

Former University of North Carolina All-American Sara Daavettila won her only ITF women's World Tennis Tour titles last June in San Diego, sweeping the singles and doubles in the SoCal Pro Series at Barnes Tennis Center. The 26-year-old picked up her second singles title today, with the No. 3 seed blanking 16-year-old Maya Iyengar 6-0, 6-0 in the final. Daavettila, who lost only one set this week, in her first round win over Megan McCray(Oklahoma State), didn't play last week's W15 in San Diego, but is on the entry list for this coming week's tournament. Daavettila's teammate in 2020-21, Fiona Crawley, is at the top of the entry list for next week in San Diego.

These are the four winners on the USTA Pro Circuit, but several other current and just graduated collegians won titles outside the United States today, and because I don't think I'll be able to feature them in my June Aces, I'll note them here.

Recent Pepperdine graduate Janice Tjen won her first two ITF women's World Tennis Tour titles this week at the W15 in Monastir Tunisia. The 22-year-old from Indonesia, who qualified for the main draw, defeated No. 5 seed Patricija Paukstyte of Lithuania 6-1, 7-6(1). She and Canadian Leena Bennetto(Princeton) won the doubles title as wild cards, beating No. 3 seeds Paukstyte and Alica Rusova of Slovakia 6-4, 6-1 in the final.

It was a good week for Pepperdine Waves, with men's sophomore Edward Winter of Australia winning his second ITF men's World Tennis Tour singles title at a $15K in Korea. The unseeded 19-year-old beat two Illinois players in the semifinals and finals today, first taking out rising senior Karlis Ozolins of Latvia 6-2, 6-4, and in the final, current assistant coach Zeke Clark, the No. 8 seed, 6-3, 3-6, 7-5.

Recent Kentucky graduate Taha Baadi of Canada won his first ITF men's World Tennis Tour title at the $15K in the Dominican Republic. The unseeded 22-year-old defeated No. 4 seed Peter Bertran(Georgia, South Florida) 7-5, 6-4 in the final. 

Coco Gauff won her first major in women's doubles, after losing in the 2021 US Open final with Caty McNally, and the 2022 Roland Garros final with Jessica Pegula. This tournament Gauff was playing with Katerina Siniakova, who claimed the Roland Garros titles in 2018 and 2021, and in their first competition as partners, the No. 5 seeds won the title, beating unseeded Jasmine Paolini and Sara Errani of Italy 7-6(5), 6-3 in today's final. 

For more on the 20-year-old Gauff's second slam title, see this article from the Roland Garros website. 

Bigun Claims Roland Garros Boys Title, Valentova Sweeps Girls Championships; Former Tulsa Star Arevalo Wins Men's Doubles; Branstine Reaches Sumter W75 Final; Holt and Trotter Meet in Tyler Challenger Final

Kaylan Bigun joked that he's now a junior clay court specialist, after adding the Roland Garros boys title to the J500 he won last month in Milan. The 18-year-old left-hander from California, who has had some success on Har-Tru, including a semifinal at last year's Orange Bowl, has gotten his best results on hard courts, at least until this spring.

Today in Paris, the No. 5 seed withstood a barrage of huge serves from unseeded Tomasz Berkieta of Poland to come back for a 4-6, 6-3, 6-3 victory, becoming the first American boy since Tommy Paul in 2015 to earn the Roland Garros boys title.

Bigun had also come from a set down against No. 2 seed Joel Schwaerzler of Austria in Friday's semifinals, and the had a similar dynamic, although Berkieta will probably look back at the first game of the second set with some regret. After closing out the first set with a love hold, the 17-year-old from Warsaw had four break points in the first game of the second set. Bigun got through that game and didn't face another break point in the rest of the match. Berkieta, who averaged 125 mph on his first serve, topping out at 139 on one serve, did bring some suspense into the final game. After saving three match points in his 7-6(3), 4-6, 7-6(4) semifinal win over Lorenzo Carboni of Italy Friday, Berkieta saved three more serving at 3-5 in the third, but Bigun just shrugged at the ace, forehand winner and backhand that forced an error that saved those match points. With Berkieta's first serve deserting him at the worst possible time, Bigun could wait him out in the rallies, and that's what he did on the fourth match point, with Berkieta making a forehand error after a 10-shot rally. For more on Bigun's win, see this article from the ITF junior website.

Bigun, who now has a 12-match winning streak at the highest two levels of the ITF Junior Circuit, is the fourth US boy to win the Roland Garros singles title in the Open era, along with John McEnroe in 1977, Bjorn Fratangelo in 2011 and Paul in 2015.

Tereza Valentova swept the girls titles, with the No. 12 seed taking the singles championship with a 6-3, 7-6(0) victory over No. 3 seed Laura Samson in the first all-Czech junior slam final in history. A US Open girls finalist in 2023, the 17-year-old Valentova got off to a quick start, taking a 3-0 lead, but Samson shook off her nerves and pulled even before Valentova won the next three games to take the first set. In the second set, Valentova again took the lead and again Samson came back, and when Valentova couldn't serve out the match at 6-5, Samson had reason to be optimistic. The 16-year-old played poorly to start the tiebreaker however, and this time didn't have enough time to recover, with Valentova closing out her sixth straight-sets victory of the week. For more on the girls final, see this article from the ITF junior website.

Valentova, the third Czech girls singles champion in the past four years at Roland Garros, then went on to claim the doubles title with Renata Jamrichova of Slovakia. The No. 3 seeds, who also didn't drop a set all tournament, ended the junior slam run of No. 4 seeds Iva Jovic and Tyra Grant, the Australian Open champions, 6-4, 6-4.

The boys doubles title went to top seeds Nicolai Budkov Kjaer of Norway and Schwaerzler, who came from 5-0 down in the second set to defeat No. 2 seeds Federico Cina of Italy and Rei Sakamoto of Japan 6-4, 7-6(3).

Former Tulsa standout Marcelo Arevalo of El Salvador won his second major men's doubles title today at Roland Garros, with partner Mate Pavic of Croatia. No. 9 seeds Pavic and Arevalo, who had won the Roland Garros title in 2022 with Jean-Julien Rojer(UCLA), defeated No. 11 seeds Simone Bolelli and Andrea Vavassori of Italy 7-5, 6-3 in the final. Pavic is now just the sixth man to win all four slams during his career, all with different partners. For more on the men's doubles final, see this article from the Roland Garros website.

Coco Gauff will play for the women's doubles title Sunday, with Katerina Siniakova of the Czech Republic, against the Italian team of Jasmine Paolini, who lost in the women's singles final today to Iga Swiatek, and Sara Errani. 

Carson Branstine, who was instrumental in Texas A&M's first NCAA team title last month, is back on the Pro Circuit this week in Sumter South Carolina and has advanced to the final at the W75 event.  The 23-year-old from Southern California, who represents Canada, defeated top seed Maria Mateas(Duke) 6-3, 6-2 to reach her third final in her last three Pro Circuit tournaments. Branstine will play Sophie Chang, who is also unseeded, in the final after Chang defeated Allie Kiick 6-4, 6-3.

In the doubles final, former Baylor standouts Melany Solange Krywoj of Argentina and Alicia Herrero Liana of Spain, who were unseeded, defeated top seeds Chang and Dalayna Hewitt 6-3, 6-3 for their third and biggest title of the year. Krywoj and Herrero Liana have won five titles on the women's World Tennis Tour in the past four years.

At the ATP Challenger 75 in Tyler Texas, Brandon Holt(USC) and James Trotter(Ohio State) of Japan will play in the final Sunday, with one of them getting his first Challenger title. The 26-year-old Holt, who reached his first Challenger final in January at Indian Wells, got his first straight-sets win of the week in today's semifinal, beating No. 8 seed Liam Draxl(Kentucky) of Canada 6-3, 7-5. The 24-year-old Trotter, also unseeded, beat No. 2 seed Coleman Wong of Hong Kong 6-4, 4-6, 7-6(4) to reach his first Challenger final in his first year on the Pro Circuit, after leaving Ohio State with the NCAA doubles title last spring.

While Trotter is just now advancing to a Challenger final in singles, his doubles pedigree has been evident throughout the year, and today he won the fifth Challenger doubles title of his career, but a first with Hans Hach Verdugo(Abilene Christian) of Mexico. Trotter and Hach, seeded No. 2, defeated former Florida Gators Andres Andrade of Ecuador and Abdullah Shelbayh of Jordan, who were unseeded, 7-6(3), 6-4 in this evening's final.

A pair of former Texas A&M Aggies, Hady Habib of Lebanon and Trey Hilderbrand, won their first ATP Challenger doubles titles today at the Challenger 50 in Argentina. The unseeded pair defeated Ignacio Carou of Uruguay and Facundo Mena of Argentina, also unseeded, 6-7(5), 6-2, 10-4 in the final. 

At the SoCal Pro Series in San Diego, Maya Iyengar advanced to her first Pro Circuit final in just her second tournament, with the 16-year-old from Arizona defeating Carolyn Campana(Wake Forest, Vanderbilt, Pepperdine) 6-3, 2-6, 6-1 in the women's semifinals. She will face former UNC All-American Sara Daavettila, the No. 3 seed, who defeated Aspen Schuman 6-4, 7-5.

Campana won the doubles title, however, with Pepperdine's All-American Lisa Zaar of Sweden. The No. 2 seeds defeated top seeds and USC teammates Eryn Cayetano and Australia's Lily Fairclough 6-7(3), 6-4, 11-9 in this evening's final.

The men's singles final Sunday will be between the top two seeds, just as it was last week, with No. 1 Learner Tien(USC), who won the title last week in San Diego, facing No. 2 Alafia Ayeni(Cornell/Kentucky). Tien defeated No. 7 seed Noah Schachter 6-3, 6-2, while Ayeni beat Alan Rubio(UCF) of Mexico 7-6(6), 6-2.

Arizona State teammates Max McKennon and Jacob Bullard won their first Pro Circuit titles today in doubles, with the unseeded pair defeating Jeremy Jin(Florida) of Australia and Lui Maxted(TCU) of Great Britain 6-2, 6-3 in this morning's final.