Qualifier Nilsson Shocks World No. 1 Pareja to Reach Quarterfinals, Wild Card Johnson Sole American Remaining in US Open Junior Singles; Cash and Tracy Advance to Men's Doubles Semifinals; Anisimova Avenges Wimbledon Loss

©Colette Lewis 2025--
Flushing Meadows, NY--

A week ago, Lea Nilsson was in Canada, scrambling to find a flight to New York for the US Open Junior Championships qualifying after a second round loss at the ITF J300 in Repentigny. The 17-year-old left-hander from Sweden got on a plane Thursday morning, with her first round qualifying match scheduled for not before 3 p.m. the same day, and had to get her credential before traveling to the Cary Leeds Tennis Center in the Bronx. 

It's little wonder that she dropped her first set to American Ireland O'Brien, but she came back to win the match 10-7 in the match tiebreaker, and qualified for the main draw on Friday.

Today, on Louis Armstrong Stadium, the 78th-ranked Nilsson shocked ITF World Junior No. 1 Julia Pareja 6-4, 3-6, 6-3, a result she attributed to her focus and even temperament. 

"The court was very big, but I just focused on my things, not around, just on me," said Nilsson, who trains at the Salk Tennis Club in Stockholm. "Obviously I knew she was a good player, very solid, and I just focused on keeping my level up and keeping my tempo high, just challenge her in the rallies." 

Varying her serve placement helped Nilsson keep Pareja from attacking, and Nilsson was able to come up with effective serves when she needed them to hold off a comeback from Pareja. Nilsson said she was determined to stay on offense as she looked to close out the match serving for it at 5-3 in the third.

"Just keep being aggressive, keep doing what I was doing, not relax or be passive," Nilsson said of her mindset when stepping to the line to complete the upset.

After Nilsson served out the match at 40-15, forcing an error from Pareja after a lengthy forehand to backhand rally, she barely allowed herself a reaction, with a brief fist pump in celebration.

"Usually I'm not so emotional, if I win or if I lose, it's kind of the same," Nilsson said. "There were a lot of emotions, no, not emotions, but thoughts. Excited of course, but maybe I seemed less happy on the outside."

Nilsson will play No. 8 seed Charo Esquiva Banuls of Spain, who defeated unseeded Kanon Sawashiro of Japan 6-0, 3-6, 6-4. The two played previously in the 2022 European 14s championships, with Esquiva Banuls winning in a third set tiebreaker.

No. 2 seed Hannah Klugman of Great Britain again dropped her first set, but rebounded to beat unseeded Julie Pastikova of the Czech Republic 1-6, 6-3, 6-4. She will play No. 5 seed Julia Stusek of Germany, who ended the run of 15-year-old wild card Welles Newman 6-4, 6-3.

No. 3 seed Kristina Penickova ran up against the red-hot No. 14 seed Jeline Vandromme of Belgium, who now has a 20-match winning streak since the end of July with her 6-2, 6-3 win today. Vandromme will play unseeded Ksenia Efremova of France, last week's champion in Canada, who beat Xinran Sun of China 6-2, 6-0, avenging her loss to Sun in the second round of the College Park J300 two weeks ago. 

The other girls quarterfinal will be a rematch of an opening round match at Wimbledon this year, with 2025 Wimbledon girls champion Mia Pohankova of Slovakia facing 2024 US Open girls champion Mika Stojsavljevic of Great Britain. The unseeded Pohankova, who defeated No. 7 seed Stojsavljevic 7-6(4), 6-1 to start her run to the Wimbledon title, had the much easier win today. Pohankova, seeded fourth, defeated Yushan Shao of China 6-3, 6-4, while No. 9 seed Stojsavljevic came from 4-0 down in the third set to beat 15-year-old Czech Jana Kovackova, the No. 6 seed, 5-7, 6-1, 7-5.

In the biggest upset of the day in the boys draw, No. 14 seed Oliver Bonding of Great Britain defeated No. 2 seed Andres Santamarta Roig of Spain 6-3, 6-4, capitalizing on the fast courts to make his final junior slam by far his most successful one.

Bonding was 0-10 in junior slams prior to this week, so his 4-6, 6-2, 7-6(0) win over Jack Secord in the first round was, as he described it, a relief.

"It's been tough," said the 18-year-old, who received entry to Roland Garros based on his ranking in 2023 and has played every junior slam since. "I've haven't performed the way I've wanted to in the slams. I got myself into the slams early, had a couple of tough draws at the start, but I really didn't perform to my level. I think coming in here I just wanted to enjoy it, I knew it would be my last slam and here I was just trying to be more relaxed, framing it a little differently, just go out there and have fun.  I was close to going out here in the first too, down 4-2 in the third, so everything now is just a bonus for me."

Bonding had beaten Santamarta on clay last year, and the faster surface here in New York tilted the match even more in his favor.

"I was more aggressive and also more stable from the back," said the 6-foot-4 right-hander. "The speed of the court kind of showed and he was uncomfortable with the ball in play."

Bonding was cruising to the finish line on the Grandstand court, up 5-4, 40-15, but he botch a forehand sitter at the net, sending it well wide. He missed his first serve on the second match point, but got an error from Santamarta to convert it.

"I had that easy forehand, I was definitely tight going into the second one, missed the first serve," Bonding said. "But it was kind of the story of the match, that last match point. I was a little more stable in the rally and he kind of wanted to pull the trigger and missed."

Bonding will face unseeded Luis Guto Miguel of Brazil, who defeated No. 9 seed Jack Kennedy 6-4, 6-4 to extend his winning streak to eight matches after claiming the title at the ITF J300 in Canada last week.

Miguel, who is competing in his sixth junior slam while still just 16 years old, let his mind skip ahead a bit in the second set.

"It was 6-4, 4-0 for me and I started to think, oh, I'm in the quarterfinals," Miguel said. "It's one thing I talk to about my mental coach about, and he says don't think about it. So when I stopped thinking, that's when I won the match."

A successful young Brazilian like Miguel has an obvious hero, with Joao Fonseca, now in the ATP Top 50, just two years removed from this 2023 US Open boys title.

"He inspires me, and not just me, but all the kids that are playing now, the young guys," Miguel said. "We practiced two weeks (in March) in Rio de Janeiro; he's a great guy, powerful. Two weeks, real intensity. He's an amazing guy."

The odds that 16-year-old wild card Andrew Johnson would be the last American standing in the US Open junior singles were slim coming into the event, but his debut has gone even better than he expected after his 7-5, 6-3 win over No. 15 seed Ronit Karki today.

"This is my first grand slam, so who would have thought this, really?," Johnson said. "I'm super excited. I'll look back on this five, 10, 15 years from now, forever. It's really cool."

Down 3-0 to start, Johnson withstood the barrage of winners Karki was hitting and began to find his level.

"I started off kind of slow and he started off really good," Johnson said. "He didn't miss a ball in the first three games. It kind of evened out. I played pretty good, I stayed focused throughout the whole match and was having fun toward the end of the match. Towards the end of the match, some guy came and sat in the top of in the stands and said 'Let's go Socal' and I pointed at him, funny things like that."

Johnson made 85% of his first serves in the second set and had 17 winners and just 11 unforced errors. Karki never had a look at a break point, while his unforced errors, which totaled 53, piled up.

Johnson will face No. 5 seed Alexander Vasilev Thursday, after the 18-year-old left-hander from Bulgaria won a high-quality match with 2024 Australian Open boys finalist Jan Kumstat of the Czech Republic 7-5, 4-6, 7-6(7). Kumstat, trailing throughout the 10-point tiebreaker, got back on serve at 6-7, but he didn't make his first serve and was broken giving Vasilev some breathing room. Up 8-7, Vasilev hit a 128 mph serve and a plus-one forehand winner to get to match point. A nearly carbon copy of that point finished off Kumstat, with a 130 mph serve and a plus-one forehand winner an emphatic end to an entertaining contest.

A third unseeded boy reached the quarterfinals, with Zangar Nurlanuly of Kazakhstan beating No. 6 seed Osaki Paldanius of Finland 3-6, 6-1, 6-2. Nurlanuly will face No. 13 seed Timofei Derepasko, who beat Hidde Schoenmakers of the Netherlands 6-1, 6-0 in less than an hour.

Top seed Ivan Ivanov defeated unseeded Maximus Dussault 7-6(3), 6-4 to set up yet another junior slam contest against No. 8 seed Max Schoenhaus of Germany. Schoenhaus, who defeated qualifier Tito Chavez of Spain 6-2, 4-6, 6-1, beat Ivanov in the semifinals in Roland Garros, with Ivanov returning the favor in the semifinals at Wimbledon.

The doubles quarterfinals are set for Thursday, with two major upsets today in the girls doubles. Top seeds Klugman and Pohankova lost to ITF J300 College Park champions Kamonwan Yodpetch of Thailand and Ruien Zhang of China 7-6(2), 6-4. No. 2 seeds Kristina Penickova, a two-time junior slam doubles champion in 2025, and Stojsavljevic lost to Yihan Qu of China and Kanon Sawashiro of Japan 6-4, 6-4.

Thea Frodin, playing with Victoria Barros of Brazil, is the only American girl in either draw.

The boys doubles quarterfinals feature ten Americans, including wild cards Michael Antonius and Matisse Farzam, who will play No. 6 seeds Keaton Hance and Jack Kennedy, guaranteeing an American team in the semifinals.

The boys doubles draw is here.

Wednesday's third round junior singles results of Americans:

Luis Guto Miguel(BRA) d. Jack Kennedy[9] 6-4, 6-4

Andrew Johnson[WC] d. Ronit Karki[15] 7-5, 6-3

Ivan Ivanov[1](BUL) d. Maximus Dussault 7-6(3), 6-4 

Lea Nilsson[Q](SWE) d. Julieta Pareja[1] 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 

Jeline Vandromme[14](BEL) d. Kristina Penickova[3] 6-2, 6-3

Julia Stusek[5](GER) Welles Newman[WC] 6-4, 6-3

Robert Cash and JJ Tracy continued their run in men's doubles, advancing to the semifinals with a 6-1, 7-6(7) win over No. 15 seeds Sadio Doumbia(Georgia) and Fabien Reboul of France.

The unseeded Cash and Tracy, the 2024 NCAA spring doubles champions while seniors at Ohio State, will face No. 5 seeds Marcel Granollers of Spain and Horacio Zeballos of Argentina Thursday for a place in the final.

No. 8 seed Amanda Anisimova avenged her 6-0, 6-0 loss to Iga Swiatek in the Wimbledon final, beating the No. 2 seed 6-4, 6-3.

For more on her win this afternoon, see this usopen.org article.

Anisimova will face Naomi Osaka of Japan in the semifinals

tomorrow night. 

Admission to the grounds of the USTA Billie Jean King Tennis Center is free Thursday, with junior and wheelchair competition, as well as the men's doubles semifinals, on the schedule, beginning at noon.