IMG Academy International Recap; Wild Card Clarke Ousts No. 9 Seed, Frodin Rebounds to Advance to Orange Bowl Third Round; No. 3 and 4 Seeds Fall in Boys Draw; Quarterfinals Set for 16s Division; Junior Orange Bowl Seeds; Ojai Lands Big Ten Conference Tournament

©Colette Lewis 2024--
Plantation FL--

My recap of the 12s, 14s, and 16s division finals last week at the IMG Academy International Tennis Championships in Bradenton was posted today at the Tennis Recruiting Network. The 16s singles champions are still in contention for the Orange Bowls titles this week.

The 20 courts at the Veltri Tennis Center were busy throughout the day Wednesday, with the lengthy matches not cooperating as the tournament schedulers tried to beat the afternoon rain. The brief downpour after 3 p.m. interrupted the third sets of two girls second round matches and many double matches, but with the delay less than an hour on most courts, all matches on the schedule were completed.

Fifteen-year-old wild card Zaire Clarke had long completed her 6-2, 6-1 win over No. 9 seed Julie Pastikova in her J500 tournament debut.

Clarke, who had won five matches last week in Bradenton, three in qualifying and two in the main draw, was feeling optimistic coming into the tournament. 

"That tournament gave me a lot of matches, and just seeing the level, because it's a lot of the same girls that come here," Clarke said. "So knowing that I can play with them, it gives you more confidence, to really just trust yourself and play your game."

After handling the ITF World No. 29 Pastikova with a combination of powerful groundstrokes and productive transitions to the net, Clarke has wiped away any doubts.

"I was really focused on moving forward, playing on my terms," said Clarke, who trains with Romain Deridder at Pro World in . "And on my body language. Sometimes when I miss balls it's really annoying, but staying even, I've been working on that."

Clarke saw that Pastikova was not following the mental strategy she wanted to employ.

"In the first set she played well, but I just kept pressing and she started getting down on herself, I feel," said Clarke. "Before she was very verbal, talking positive to herself, but then she started dying down a little bit."

Pastikova, 16, who was missing a lot of routine shots, had a glimmer of hope at the end, with Clarke trying to serve it out at 5-0. Double faults doomed her attempt to end it on her serve, and Pastikova had game points in her service game at 5-1, but Clarke kept the pressure on, hitting winners or staying in rallies until Pastikova made an error.

"She started to get up again after I lost my service game, but I was like, ok, just go back to basics and play solid," Clarke said. 

Clarke didn't have an opportunity to play the Orange Bowl last year, as she was out with injury, but since then she has changed her forehand and is much more comfortable with that shot now.

"I liked my backhand better before, but now I like them both pretty equally," Clarke said. "I feel like they're both pretty trustworthy."

Clarke will need both against her next opponent, No. 5 seed Elizara Yaneva of Bulgaria, who has yet to lose a game in her two matches this week. Yaneva won the J500 in Mexico the week before the Bradenton J300, so is now on an eight-match winning streak at the J500 level.

Top seed Wakana Sonobe of Japan lost the first set for the second consecutive match and had to extricate herself from a tricky situation late in the second set against Nellie Taraba Wallberg of Sweden. The match was moved to Court 28, the farthest court from the main entrance, due to the length of the previous matches, so only a few spectators made the trek to see how the US Open girls finalist would fare.

Taraba Wallberg was up 4-2 in the second set after taking the first set 6-2 and had two game points for a 5-2 lead, but the 17-year-old dropped the three-deuce game, only to go up 0-40 on Sonobe's serve at 3-4. That's the point that Sonobe really locked down, eliminating the unforced errors, powering through with her lefty forehand, winning five straight points to reach 4-all. 

Sonobe continued at her top level, and although Taraba Wallberg kept fighting, she was unable to hold at 5-all, and Sonobe closed out the set on her second set point with a forehand winner. 

The third set was 6-1, just as it was in her opening round match Monday against Ada Kumru of Turkey. Sonobe's opponent in Thursday's third round is unseeded Ksenia Efremova of France.

No. 10 seed Thea Frodin was also sent to the farthest reaches of the Tennis Center on Court 22, where she played Allegra Korpanec Davies of Great Britain. Frodin, the 2023 Orange Bowl 16s finalist, admitted that she made the 6-3, 6-7(6), 6-4 victory much harder than it needed to be.

"I had at least five or six match points in that set," said the 15-year-old Frodin, who ended up losing the last of those match points when double faulting at 6-5 in the tiebreaker. "Honestly my serve was not my best friend this match. After I lost that tiebreaker, I was still so shocked, I don't think I've ever given away that many match points in my life. The first three games of the third I didn't really know what I was doing on the court still."

Down 0-3, Frodin took a medical timeout to have her left hamstring taped, but got the break back to make it 4-3 as the rain shower arrived. When play resumed Frodin held, broke and held to finally extricate herself from the holes she kept digging for herself. 

"I took a little bit of a rain break for half an hour and I think I got my rhythm back, or gained more rhythm than she did with the rain break," Frodin said. "My serve was my focus and I was glad it worked out in the end."

Frodin will play No. 8 seed and Bradenton J300 finalist Tereza Krejcova of the Czech Republic, who beat wild card Hannah Ayrault 7-5, 7-6(10).

Frodin and Clarke are two of four US girls in the round of 16, along with unseeded Monika Ekstrand and No. 3 seed Kristina Penickova, who play each other. Ekstrand defeated Suha Lee of Korea, who served for the match at 6-5 in the third, 2-6, 6-3, 7-6(2). Penickova had a short match, with qualifier Amelie Hejtmanek of the Czech Republic retiring after losing the first set 6-0.

Two of the top four boys seeds went out today, with Moise Kouame of France defeating No. 4 seed Hoyoung Roh of Korea 6-2, 1-6, 6-1 and Timofei Derepasko beating No. 3 seed Jan Kumstat of the Czech Republic 6-4, 1-6, 6-4. 

Four American boys advanced to the round of 16s: Jack Kennedy, who beat Viktor Frydrych of Great Britain 6-3, 6-2; No. 16 seed Maxwell Exsted a 6-4, 6-4 winner over Valentin Garay of Argentina; wild card Jack Satterfield, who defeated Ty Host of Australia 6-1, 6-3, and Matisse Farzam, who beat qualifier Haydar Gokpinar of Turkey 6-3, 6-2.

Kennedy will play top seed Maxim Mrva of the Czech Republic, who defeated Noah Johnston 6-2, 6-1.

Kennedy and Charlie Robertson of Great Britain, the top seeds in doubles, lost in the second round today to Mrva and Vojtech Vales of the Czech Republic 6-2, 7-5.

The 16s quarterfinals are set for Thursday, with the top seeds still vying for the girls and boys singles titles.

Quarterfinals:

Boys:

Zavier Augustin[1](USA) v Matthew Shapiro[11](USA)

Agassi Rusher[3](USA) v Ford McCollum[5](USA)

William Zhang[9](USA) v David Wu(USA)

Samim Filiz[7](TUR) v Jordan Lee[2](USA)

Girls:

Hanne Estrada[1](MEX) v Kaia Giribalan(USA)

Sarah Ye(USA) v Catherine Rennard(USA)

Jensen Diianni(USA) v Xiaotong Wang[4](CHN)

Sophie Triquart[9](GER) v Welles Newman[2](USA)

The double semifinals in the 16s are also scheduled for Thursday.

The order of play for Thursday and the draws can be found at https://www.ustaorangebowl.com/draws. The link for live scoring: https://orangebowltennis.smtinternetservices.com/mip.aspx

The Junior Orange Bowl for 12s and 14s, which I am not covering in person, is early this year, with the main draw beginning Thursday.

The Top 16 seeds are below. There was no time to determine the countries of the seeds, because they are no longer shown on the draws.

Boys 12s 

1. Ethan Jake Frans

2. Rex Kulman

3. Daniel Gardality

4. Novak Palombo

5. Cavan Donnelly

6. Max Hodkinson

7. Reita Yamanaka

8. Aleksandr Kharkov

9. James Borchard

10. Sebastian Lavorato

11. Ethan Cyrus

12. Pekko Pfundstein

13. Christian Pohoski

14. Wyatt Markham

15. Nathan Lee

16. Patricio Alvarez Chavez

Boys 14s

1. Taki Takizawa

2. Ethan Domingo

3. Dongjae Kim

4. Rafalentino Dacosta

5. Gadin Arun

6. Lucas Han

7. Tabb Tuck

8. Anurag Shourya Kallambella

9. Heaton Pann

10. Qi Hongjin

11. Dharma Pantaratorn

12. Junseo Jang

13. Daniil Berezin

14. Anay Kulkarni

15. Ruben Stanmore

16. Hruthik Katakam

Girls 12s

1. Nikol Davletshina

2. Isha Manchala

3. Nadia Poznick

4. Arina Fomina

5. Anna Kapanadze

6. Gwyneth Britton

7. Seohyeon Kim

8. Capri Butera

9. Shina Okuyama

10. Mila Mikoczi Spivey

11. Ana Maric

12. Inie Toli 

13. Christina Li

14. Jacqueline Nick

15. Srishti Kiran

16. Aimee Peng

Girls 14

1. Tea Kovacevic

2. Caroline Shao

3. Baotong Xu

4. Jiayi Lu

5. Jinling Shi

6. Alisa Terentyeva

7. Sim Siyoen

8. Vibha Gogineni

9. Sofiia Bielinska

10. Rosie Cho

11. Sera Park

12. Shristi Selvan

13. Sakino Miyazawa

14. Tori Russell

15. Jiali Dong

16. Corinne Winningham

The draws can be found at the USTA tournament site.

The Big Ten women's conference championships will be played at The Ojai in 2025, a welcome announcement after the loss of the Pac-12 championship connection at that historic event. The men's conference tournament is expected to be held in Ojai in 2026. The full release:

Big Ten Conference Women’s Tennis Tournament Coming West to Compete at The Ojai

 

Nation’s Oldest Athletic Conference Started In 1896 – the Same Year As One Of Country’s Oldest Tournaments – Heads to Ojai for the 123^rd Edition Of Historic Event During the Last Week Of April

 

OJAI, Calif. (December 11, 2024) – The Big Ten Conference is coming to The Ojai. 

 

The Big Ten Women’s Tennis Tournament will take place April 23-26, 2025, as part of the 123^rd annual Ojai Tennis Tournament, Ojai Valley Tennis Club President Carolyn Burke and Big Ten Conference have announced.

 

The Big Ten Conference – the oldest NCAA Division I collegiate athletic conference in the United States founded in 1896 – was founded the same year as one of the nation’s oldest tennis tournaments, The Ojai, the classic event played under the massive eucalyptus and oak trees overhanging Libbey Park in downtown Ojai.

 

“We couldn’t be more thrilled to welcome the Big Ten Conference to The Ojai to stage their conference tournaments,” Burke said. “We feel having the Big Ten schools coming to compete will only add to the legacy of our storied tournament.”

 

“We look forward to partnering with the Ojai Valley Tennis Club as they host the 2025 Big Ten Women’s Tennis Tournament,” said Becky Pany, Big Ten Conference, Senior Vice President, Sports Administration. “The Ojai will be an exciting post-season opportunity for our student-athletes, coaches and fans, both locally and from across the country.”

 

Longtime UCLA women’s coach Stella Sampras-Webster was an Ojai Tennis Tournament champion as a junior growing up in Southern California and made two doubles finals and one in singles playing for the Bruins in the early 1990s.  

 

“We are super excited to have the Big Ten Tournament at Ojai this season,” Sampras-Webster said. “Ojai has a unique charm, and it holds a special place for us. We have so much history playing there. The weather is great, people are so hospitable, and the town is so supportive. It's such a privilege to be back there to compete for a Big Ten Tournament championship.”  

 

The 17 other Big Ten schools include Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maryland, Michigan, Michigan State, Minnesota, Nebraska, Northwestern, Oregon, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue, Rutgers, USC, Washington, and Wisconsin. The top 12 teams will earn direct entry and qualify to play at The Ojai.

 

The 2024 Big Ten Conference Women's Tennis Tournament took place at the University of Michigan's Varsity Tennis Center with the Wolverines beating The Ohio State Buckeyes to win the title.