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.