Frodin, Santamarta Capture J500 Banana Bowl Championships; Pro Singles Titles for Quartet of Americans Sunday; LSU's Cross Returns for 4-0 Win Over Tennessee; Chicago Claims D-III Women's Indoor Title

Sixteen-year-old Thea Frodin won her first J500 title and 18-year-old Andres Santamarta Roig of Spain earned his second straight Sunday with straight-set victories at the Banana Bowl in Gaspar Brazil.

Frodin, the No. 11 seed, defeated No. 10 seed Sol Ailin Larraya Guidi of Argentina 6-3, 6-1, while Santamarta downed No. 8 seed Joao Pedro Didoni Bonini of Brazil 6-4, 6-0.  

The finals, which were live streamed on YouTube, were one-sided contests; I'm sure the finalists had played much better in their matches leading up to their first J500 finals than they did today. Santamarta has built a 12-0 winning streak at J500s on clay after claiming the Orange Bowl title in December. Currently No. 6 in the ITF junior rankings, he won't take over the No. 1 spot, but he certainly has it in his sights now with the J500 in Milan and Roland Garros, on his best surface, just a few months away.

Frodin should move into the Top 20 for the first time with her title, following a final and a doubles title at last week's J300 in Porto Alegre.

Frodin was just one of many bright spots for American tennis this weekend, with Ronit Karki and Jack Satterfield taking the Banana Bowl doubles title on the ITF Junior Circuit and Evan King(Michigan) and Christian Harrison winning another ATP title as qualifiers at the Acapulco 500, as they had done at the Dallas 500 three weeks ago.

Then there are the singles titles, with Brandon Holt(USC) claiming the Challenger 125 in India, Eliot Spizzirri(Texas) sweeping the titles at the Challenger 100 in San Diego, Jessica Pegula winning the WTA 250 in Austin Texas and Emma Navarro(Virginia) taking the title at the WTA 500 in Merida Mexico. 

The third-seeded Holt, who had reached the Challenger 100 final last week in Pune India and the semifinals of the Challenger 125 in Bahrain two weeks ago, defeated No. 7 seed Shintaro Mochizuki of Japan 6-3, 6-3 in the final for his second career Challenger title, both coming this year. Holt is now up to a new career-high of 111 in the ATP live rankings.

Spizzirri won his first Challenger title in his third appearance in a final, defeating No. 4 seed Mackenzie McDonald(UCLA) 6-4, 2-6, 6-4 this afternoon at Barnes Tennis Center. Spizzirri got an early break in the third set and was able to hold onto it, although he didn't convert a match point with McDonald serving at 3-5, and needed to save two break points servng for the match at 5-4 to get the job done on his fourth match point. Some clutch serving in the final points of that last game helped, and he hit a great stretch volley deep in the court that McDonald couldn't hand to finally close it out.

Spizzirri and Tyler Zink won their second Challenger doubles title as a team, defeating the wild card team of Noah Zamora(UC-Irvine) and Juan Jose Bianchi(SMU, Boston College) 6-7(3), 7-6(4), 10-8 in the Saturday night final. 

Spizzirri is now at 144 in the ATP live rankings with this title.

The top-seeded Pegula defeated No. 5 seed McCartney Kessler(Florida) 7-5, 6-2 in Austin for her seventh career WTA title. Navarro, the top seed in Mexico, breezed to her second career WTA title, beating qualifier Emiliana Arango of Colombia 6-0, 6-0, one of just five WTA finals this century that featured that score.

Division I conference play is in full swing, and keeping track of all the matches can be a challenge. I suggest you go to collegetennisranks.com and click on the Week Behind tab to get a quick overview of what's happened in the past three days. 

There are two top 10 conference contests I wanted to mention, with the top-ranked Wake Forest men continuing unbeaten after defeating No. 6 Stanford, an ACC newcomer, 4-2 on Friday. Wake's Team Indoor hero Stefan Dostanic did not play this weekend for the Demon Deacons, who also beat No. 22 Cal today. Stanford also lost to No. 10 NC State today, so the former Pac-12 schools from Northern California went 0-4 on their first trip to North Carolina for conference play.

Today in the SEC, the seventh-ranked Tennessee women traveled to Baton Rouge to play No. 7 LSU, and the home team dominated 4-0.  Freshman Kayla Cross, who played her semifinal and final Saturday to secure the W35 USTA Pro Circuit title in Arcadia California somehow managed to make it to Baton Rouge in time for Sunday morning's match and physically capable of playing both singles and doubles. Cross and fellow Canadian Cadence Brace won their doubles match, and Cross had split sets at No. 2 singles when the Tigers clinched. 

In addition to Tennessee, another Top 10 SEC team lost today, with No. 6 Auburn losing to No. 53 South Carolina 4-2. South Carolina, who beat Florida on Friday, got three points from their lines 4, 5 and 6 in both matches, with all six matches routine straight-set victories for the Gamecocks. 

The University of Chicago and Claremont-Mudd-Scripps have met in the last three ITA Division III Women's Team Indoor Championships, with Chicago winning in 2023 and CMS in 2024. Today's final went the way of the Maroons, the reigning NCAA champions, who took the doubles point and three straight-sets win in singles for a 4-1 final.  For more on the final, see this ITA recap.

Frodin Reaches ITF J500 Banana Bowl Final, Satterfield and Karki Claim Doubles Title; Cross Wins W35 in Arcadia; Spizzirri and McDonald Set for San Diego Challenger Final; Last BNP Paribas Open Wild Cards Named; Kessler and Pegula Play for WTA Austin Title

Sixteen-year-old Thea Frodin, a finalist at last week's ITF J300 warm-up event in Porto Alegre, will have another crack at a title in Brazil after advancing to the championship match of the ITF J500 Banana Bowl. 

Frodin, the No. 11 seed, outlasted No. 3 seed Luna Maria Cinalli of Argentina 1-6, 7-5, 7-6(3) in today's semifinals, to set up a first meeting with No. 10 seed Sol Ailin Larraya Guidi of Argentina. Larraya Guidi prevented an all-USA final by coming from behind to defeat No. 2 seed Annika Penickova 2-6, 6-1, 6-2.

In the boys semifinals, No. 8 seed Joao Pedro Didoni Bonini of Brazil defeated No. 2 seed Jack Kennedy 6-4, 6-4, and will face top seed Andres Santamarta Roig of Spain, who had his first test of the week, but got by unseeded Pedro Henrique Chabalgoity of Brazil, 6-4, 6-7(4), 6-1 in today's semifinal. 

No. 8 seeds Jack Satterfield and Ronit Karki, who won the J300 doubles title in Colombia in January, earned their biggest title today, beating No. 4 seeds Yannick Theodor Alexandrescou of Romania and Ryo Tabata of Japan 6-4, 0-6, 10-4 in the final.

Penickova and partner Maya Iyengar, the top seeds, lost in the girls doubles final today to No. 4 seeds Victoria Luiza Barros of Brazil and Yoana Konstantinova of Bulgaria 6-3, 7-5.

LSU freshman Kayla Cross of Canada, who joined the Tigers in January while continuing to play USTA Pro Circuit events, was not with the team for yesterday's SEC conference match with Kentucky, which they won without her, 4-2. Instead, Cross was competing at the W35 in Arcadia California, where today she won two singles matches to claim her second ITF women's World Tennis Tour title.  The 19-year-old left-hander defeated wild card Fiona Crawley(UNC) 6-0, 4-6, 6-4 in the semifinals, while top seed Iva Jovic was cruising past qualifier Kylie McKenzie 6-2, 6-3. 

The extra set didn't seem to bother Cross in the final, although she did run into a hurdle or two in the second set of her 6-2, 7-6(6) win over Jovic. Up 6-2, 5-2, Cross couldn't convert her two match points serving at 5-3, then proceeded to drop her next serve as well, giving Jovic a chance to serve for the set. She was broken at love, so would have to win a tiebreaker instead, and it was Cross who came through, although she did squander three more match points up 6-3 in the tiebreaker before closing it out.

LSU, currently No. 10 in the ITA rankings, hosts No. 7 Tennessee Sunday morning, but it seems unlikely that Cross will be avaliable for that key SEC match given her two matches today and the travel that would be necessary.

A Wolfpack pair took the doubles title, with NC State recruit Tori Osuigwe and former NC State All-American Alana Smith, the No. 3 seeds, defeated No. 2 seeds Aldila Sutjiadi(Kentucky) and Janice Tjen(Oregon, Pepperdine) 6-3, 6-4 in the final. It's the 13th Pro Circuit title for Smith and the second for Osuigwe, but their first together; both have won doubles titles with Whitney Osuigwe.

Eliot Spizzirri(Texas) has advanced to his third ATP Challenger final, while Mackenzie McDonald(UCLA) has reached his ninth, with both earning three-set victories at the San Diego 100.

Spizzirri told me when I spoke with him at a Texas match at the Men's Team Indoor in Dallas that he was disappointed with his performance at the two Challengers last month in Tenerife, losing in the opening round of both. But despite having limited practice time outdoors in Dallas due to the cold and rain, his play in San Diego didn't suffer. Unseeded this week, the 23-year-old from Connecticut has won three consecutive three-setters, beating No. 8 seed Ethan Quinn 6-3, 4-6, 6-3 in today's first semifinal.

Quinn led 5-0 in the second set; Spizzirri came all the way back to 4-5, but dropped serve and the set, after saving nine set points, in that game. Unfazed by that hiccup, Spizzirri got an early break and clipped along on his service games, not facing a break point until 5-3, 30-40. He saved it to advance to his second Challenger final of the year; he lost to Colton Smith(Arizona) in the Cleveland Challenger last month to go 0-2 in Challenger finals since completing his collegiate eligibility last May.

Spizzirri is also through to the doubles final, with Tyler Zink(Georgia, Oklahoma State), with the unseeded pair defeating No. 2 seed George Goldhoff(Texas) and Trey Hilderbrand(UCF, Texas A&M) 6-4, 6-3 in the semifinals. The 2019 US Open boys doubles champions, who already have won a Challenger doubles title as a pair in 2023, will face wild cards Noah Zamora(UC-Irvine) and Juan Jose Bianchi(SMU, Boston College), who beat Jodi Maginley and Alfredo Perez(Florida) 7-5, 6-2 in the semifinals. 

No. 4 seed McDonald, the 2016 NCAA singles and doubles champion, will be looking to secure his fifth Challenger title as he tries to work his way back into the ATP Top 100. The 29-year-old from Northern California dropped the first set today, but took control from the outset of the second, beating No. 5 seed Kamil Majchrzak of Poland 3-6, 6-1, 6-1. 

McDonald got additional good news today with the announcement that he is receiving the final men's main draw wild card at next week's BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells. Caroline Dolehide, who lost last night in the quarterfinals of the WTA 250 in Austin, received the last women's main draw wild card.

The last men's qualifying wild card was awarded to SMU sophomore Trevor Svajda. Women's qualifying begins Sunday. The draws are here.

Two Americans will face off Sunday for the  WTA 250 title in Austin Texas, with top seed Jessica Pegula taking on No. 5 seed McCartney Kessler(Florida). Pegula defeated Ajla Tomljanovic of Australia 6-1, 4-6, 6-3, while Kessler beat Greet Minnen of Belgium 7-5, 6-4 in today's semifinals. It will be their first meeting.