Division I Sectionals, Conference Masters Begin Thursday for Final NCAA Individual Selections; Jovic Among 18 Americans on ITF J500 Merida Acceptance Lists

The final opportunity for enrolled collegians to earn a spot in the NCAA Division I singles and doubles championships later this month kicks off tomorrow with four Sectional Championships and a Conference Masters event for both men and women.

The Conference Masters, a joint event for men and women, is being played at the Rome Tennis Center in Rome Georgia. The seeds are below. I've included the World Tennis Numbers for the No. 1 and a No. 5 seed, as a possible indication of the strength of the fields compared to that of the Sectional Championships. The four semifinalists in singles will make the NCAA field, with three doubles teams advancing. Those with byes need only win two matches to qualifying for the NCAAs.

Men's seeds:
Singles:
1. Sebastian Dominko, Notre Dame WTN 3.7
2. Zsombor Velcz, Baylor
3. Thomas Paulsell, Georgia
4. Anton Arzhankin, Western Michigan
(top four seeds receive first round byes)

5-8
Eduardo Dias, Gardner-Webb WTN 6.9
Dimitris Paliouras, Georgia Southern
Karim Al-Amin, Middle Tennessee
Tiago Silva, Pacific

Top 4 Seeds in Doubles
1. Petar Jovanovic and Benito Sanchez Martinez, Mississippi State
2. Peter Nad and Sebastian Kominko, Notre Dame
3. Ayuma Visaya and Quinn Snyder, Hawaii
4. Eduardo Dias and Numa Lemieux-Monette, Gardner-Webb

Women's seeds:
Singles:
1. Claudia De Las Heras, San Diego WTN 11.1
2. Sofia Johnson, Old Dominion
(top two seeds receive byes)
3. Katja Wiersholm, Cal
4. Oyinlomo Quadre, Florida International

5-8
Carmen Herea, Texas WTN 12.2
Julia Haynes, UC San Diego
Divna Ratkovic, Rice
Gracie Epps, Oklahoma State

Top 4 Seeds in Doubles:
1. Celia-Belle Mohr and Sophia Webster, Vanderbilt
2. Amelia Bissett and Maria Parra Romero, Florida State
3. Daniela Rivera and Alessandra Caceres, East Tennessee
4. Veronika Kulhava and Tereza Polakova, Kansas State

Each of the Sectional Championships will produce six NCAA singles qualifiers and three doubles qualifiers. Those losing in the quarterfinals of singles will have one last chance to qualify by posting a win over another losing quarterfinalist. Each host site receives a singles and doubles wild card; it's possible to guess who received the wild cards, based on their WTNs, but a WC designation does not show on the draw, so there's nothing definitive.

EAST SECTIONAL (both genders at North Carolina)
Men's seeds:
Singles:
1. DK Suresh, Wake Forest WTN 3.6
2. Cooper Williams, Duke
3. Peter Privara, Harvard
4. Paul Inchauspe, Princeton

5-8
Adit Sinha, Cornell WTN 4.4
Braden Shick, NC State
Patrick Schoen, North Carolina
Nicolas Kotzen, Columbia

Doubles:
1. Casey Hoole and Connor Thomson, South Carolina
2. Nicolas Kotzen and Max Westphal, Columbia
3. Martin Borisiouk and Luca Staeheli, NC State
4. DK Suresh and Ioannis Xilas, Wake Forest

Women's seeds:
Singles:
1. Carson Tanguilig, North Carolina WTN 11.2
2. Sarah Hamner, South Carolina
3. Annabelle Xu, Virginia
4. Shavit Kimchi, Duke

5-8
Elaine Chervinsky, Virginia WTN 12.7
Phoebe Peus, Brown
Ellie Coleman, Duke
Emma Jackson, Duke

Doubles:
1. Emma Jackson and Eleana Yu, Duke
2. Sarah Hamner and Kaitlyn Carnicella, South Carolina
3. Irina Balus and Ellie Coleman, Duke
4. Martina Genis Salas and Annabelle Xu, Virginia

CENTRAL SECTIONAL (Women: Michigan; Men: TCU)
Women's seeds:
Singles:
1. Mia Kupres, Texas A&M (withdrew)
1. Julia Garcia Ruiz, Oklahoma WTN 11.0
2. Nicole Khirin, Texas A&M
3. Piper Charney, Michigan
4. Alina Shcherbinina, Oklahoma

5-8
Shelly Bereznyak, Ohio State WTN 12.3
Carolina Gomez Alonso, Arkansas
Lily Jones, Michigan
Vivian Ovrootsky, Texas

Doubles:
1. Nicole Khirin and Daria Smetannikov, Texas A&M
2. Reese Miller and Julia Fliegner, Michigan
3. Luciana Perry and Audrey Spencer, Ohio State
4. Julie Garcia Ruiz and Chloe Noel, Oklahoma

Men's seeds:
Singles:
1. Gavin Young, Michigan WTN 3.5
2. Trevor Svajda, SMU
3. Jack Anthrop, Ohio State
4. Aristotelis Thanos, Michigan State

5-8
JC Roddick, Texas A&M WTN 4.8
Luis Alvarez, Oklahoma
Will Jansen, Ohio State
Pierre-Yves Bailly, Texas

Doubles:
1. Pedro Vives and Lui Maxted, TCU
2. Pierre-Yves Bailly and Sebastian Gorzny, Texas
3. none showing on draw
4. Gavin Young and Bjorn Swenson, Michigan

SOUTH SECTIONAL: (Women: Georgia; Men: Florida State)
Women's seeds:
Singles:
1. Guillermina Grant, Georgia WTN 11.4
2. Catherine Aulia, Tennessee
3. Aysegul Mert, Georgia
4. Talia Neilson-Gatenby, Florida

5-8
Valeria Ray, Vanderbilt WTN 12.7
Sophia Biolay, Central Florida
Ava Hrastar, Auburn
Sofia Rojas, Georgia

Doubles:
1. Guillermina Grant and Ayesegul Mert, Georgia
2. Bridget Stammel and Valeria Ray, Vanderbilt
3. Leyla Britez Risso and Vanesa Suarez, Tennessee
4. Kate Sharabura and Scarlett Nicholson, Georgia Tech

Men's seeds:
Singles:
1. Martin Katz, Miami WTN 4.3
2. Jack Loutit, Kentucky
3. Oscar Pinto Sansano, Georgia
4. Mario Martinez Serrano, Mississippi State

5-8
Andrii Zimnokh, Alabama WTN 6.0
Niccolo Baroni, Mississippi State
Youcef Rihane, Florida State
Jeremy Jin, Florida

Doubles:
1. Jamie Connel and Corey Craig, Florida State
2. Alejandro Moreno and Alex Kotzen, Tennessee
3. Miguel Perez Pena and Oscar Pinto Sansano, Georgia
4. Niccolo Baroni and Mario Martinez Serrano, Mississippi State

WEST SECTIONAL: (Women: USC; Men: Pepperdine)
Women's seeds:

Singles:
1. Kailey Evans, San Diego WTN 11.1
2. Lan Mi, Cal
3. Emma Charney, USC
4. Anne-Christine Lutkemeyer, UCLA

5-8
Eva Alvarez Sande, Washington State WTN 13.1 (this makes no sense, 7 players with better WTNs not seeded, including her first round opponent)
Grace Piper, USC WTN 11.8
Valencia Xu, Stanford
Kate Fakih, UCLA

Doubles:
1. Valencia Xu and Alexis Blokhina, Stanford
2. Lan Mi and Berta Passola Folch, Cal
3. Anna-Marie Weissheim and Amelia Honer, UC Santa Barbara
4. Imogen Haddad and Emma Charney, USC

Men's seeds:
Singles:
1. Max Basing, Stanford WTN 3.5
2. Henry von der Schulenburg, Stanford
3. Kyle Kang, Stanford
4. Peter Makk, USC

5-8
Savriyan Danilov, San Diego 5.7
Alex Chang, Cal
Theo Dean, Cal
Dzianis Zharyn, Washington

Doubles:
1. Carl Overbeck and Theo Dean, Cal
2. Dzianis Zharyn and Cesar Bouchelaghem, Washington
3. Linus Carlsson Halldin and Maxi Homberg, Pepperdine
4. Emon Van Loben Sels and Gianluca Ballotta, UCLA

A few notes on the above.  Texas A&M's Mia Kupres is playing doubles at the WTA 125 in Midland with Ariana Arseneault(Georgia, Auburn) and after they won their first round match Monday, Kupres withdrew from the Central Sectional. With Ann Arbor less than two hours away, Kupres could have played the Sectional there had they lost that first round match.

Duke's Ellie Coleman is seeded in the East Sectional in both singles and doubles, but she was not on the doubles schedule for her first round match (with Michigan alum Kari Miller) until tonight. She is schedule to play singles in Chapel Hill at 12:30 p.m. Thursday, so that could be an issue.

The most notable absence in the Sectionals is Georgia's Anastasia Lopata, the 2024 NCAA singles finalist. Georgia had a wild card to give her, as a host site, but she is not in the draw; neither is Alexandra Vecic, who played No. 2 for Georgia in the spring.

WTN was used in both the selection and seeding, but something is off in the women's West Sectional, as per my note there. The is USC Sectional will be using Electronic Line Calling, the first time that has been used in a women's event.

Cracked Racquets will be providing coverage of the Conference Masters on the ITA YouTube Channel; I'm not sure if there are streaming options for the Sectional Championships.

The last two J500 tournaments of the year are just weeks away, with the acceptances for the J500 in Merida Mexico, November 25-December 1, is now out. The Orange Bowl acceptances are scheduled to be released next week.

I was surprised to see Iva Jovic entered in Merida, and there's no guarantee she will play, but the 16-year-old Californian is the top-ranked ITF junior in either the boys or girls field, at No. 4. She is joined by three other ITF Top 10 players: No. 8 Jeline Vandromme of Belgium, No. 9 Teodora Kostovic of Serbia and No. 10 Kristina Penickova. 

Eight other US girls were accepted into the main draw, with a cutoff of 97: Kaitlyn Rolls, Thea Frodin, Maya Iyengar, Annika Penickova, Shannon Lam, Claire An, Capucine Jauffret and Leena Friedman. Julieta Pareja is the first player out of the main draw.

The boys field also currently contains four in the ITF Top 10: No. 6 Luca Preda of Romania, No. 7 Maxim Mrva of the Czech Republic, No. 9 Charlie Robertson of Great Britain and No. 10 Hoyoung Roh of Korea. Eight US boys are in the main draw, with a cutoff of 77: Jagger Leach, Cooper Woestendick, Ian Mayew, Maxwell Exsted, Benjamin Willwerth, Noah Johnston, Kase Schinnerer and Dominick Mosejczuk.  Matisse Farzam is the first player out of the main draw.  Jack Kennedy is competing for the USA Junior Davis Cup team in Turkey November 11-17, which explains his absence.

The boys cutoff being much higher than the girls suggests that the push to finish in the year-end Top 20, thereby qualifying for wild cards via the ATP Accelerator Program, is keeping more boys playing juniors late into the year. My recent Tennis Recruiting Network article on the Accelerator Program for juniors is here.