ITF WTT Junior Finals Begin Wednesday in Chengdu; Newman Beats Top Seed at W15 in Hilton Head; Qualifying Complete at M25 and W35 Tournaments in Norman OK; USTA AO Wild Card Race Standings

The ITF World Tennis Tour Junior Finals begins with round robin play Wednesday in Chengdu, which is late tonight in the Eastern Time Zone of the United States. The two groups for boys and the two groups for girls, shown below, will produce the four semifinalists, with the knockout round beginning Saturday.

The Americans competing in the Junior Finals are Jack Kennedy, Benjamin Willwerth and Kristina Penickova.  A new ITF junior streaming platform will feature matches on all three courts, with that page here. Live scoring can be found here.

The ITF notes on the Junior Finals can be found here.

Wednesday's order of play:

In addition to the ATP Challenger 100 in Sioux Falls South Dakota, which I covered yesterday, there are four other USTA Pro Circuit tournaments this week. With the ITA Regionals also concluding this week, the fields are thin, with the qualifying draws not filling at the W35 and M25 in Norman Oklahoma.  The qualifying at the W15 in Hilton Head did fill, with many junior girls choosing to get experience and possible wins at the lowest level of the Pro Circuit.

Ciara Harding, who is now being coached by Michael Joyce, qualified for the main draw, as did 18-year-old Karma Yacavino and 16-year-olds Jensen Diianni and Kennedy Drenser-Hagmann.

Wild cards were given to Carson Tanguilig(UNC), 17-year-old Ireland O'Brien and 15-year-olds Janae Preston and Welles Newman. Preston defeated Thea Frodin, currently No. 20 in the ITF junior rankings, 6-2, 6-2, and Newman upset No. 1 seed Rinon Okuwaki of Japan 6-1, 6-4.

Sixteen-year-old Nancy Lee, using the ITF junior reserved program for entry, defeated No. 8 seed Amanda Nava Elkin of Mexico 6-2, 6-0.

At the W35 in Norman, all first round matches will play Wednesday, but qualifying is complete. Kaede Usui, a freshman at Wisconsin, Savannah Broadus, a recent Pepperdine All-American and Kailey Evans(Texas Tech, San Diego) are the Americans who reached the main draw. 

Michigan junior Piper Charney received a wild card, as did University of Oklahoma teammates Gloriana Nahum of Benin and Barakat Oyinlomo Quadre of Nigeria. Oklahoma freshman Mika Buchnik received entry via the ITF Junior Exempt program and will face top seed Elvina Kalieva in the first round. Fifteen-year-old Kristina Liutova received entry on her own ranking and will face qualifier Rose Marie Nijkamp of the Netherlands, a sophomore at Oklahoma State.

The women's equivalent of the Sioux Falls Challenger is the W100 in Tyler Texas, where W100 Macon champion Renata Zarazua of Mexico is again the top seed and Caroline Dolehide, also a WTA Top 100 player, is the No. 2 seed. 

American qualifiers are Ellie Schoppe(Furman, Florida State), Dalayna Hewitt, Mary Lewis(Arizona, Michigan State) and Abigail Rencheli(NC State).

There were just two wild cards awarded, to Texas freshman Christasha McNeil, who plays her first round match Wednesday against Rasheeda McAdoo(Georgia Tech) and 16-year-old Pan Am ITF J300 champion Chukwumelije Clarke, who lost to No. 5 seed Iryna Shymanovich of Belarus 6-2, 6-2 today. 

At the M25 in Norman, Michigan State sophomore and 2024 Kalamazoo 18s champion Matt Forbes reached the main draw via qualifying, the only American to do so. 

2023 Wimbledon boys champion Henry Searle of Great Britain is the top seed, with recent Harvard graduate Daniel Milavsky the No. 2 seed.

Wild cards were awarded to University of Oklahoma sophomores Oscar Lacides and Alejandro Melero and OU juniors Hank Trondson and Asahi Harazaki. Kaylan Bigun used the ITF junior exempt program for entry, with Sebastian Gorzny of Texas entering via the ITF collegiate Accelerator Program.

The latest USTA's Australian Open Wild Card race standings are out, with the women's second week in the books and the men's first week now complete.

Eliot Spizzirri(Texas) leads the men's standings after qualifying and reaching the quarterfinals of the ATP 250 in Belgium, while Anna Rogers has moved into second place after reaching the Macon W100 final last week.

Women's Standings -- through Week 2 of 5
(Player's current ranking in parentheses)
1. Elizabeth Mandlik (215) -- 101
2. Anna Rogers (247) -- 66
3. Alexis Blokhina (355) -- 52
4. Lea Ma (336) -- 38
5. Madison Brengle (444) -- 33

Men's Standings -- through Week 1 of 5
(Player's current ranking in parentheses)
1. Eliot Spizzirri (103) -- 63
2. Martin Damm (208) -- 44
3. Patrick Kypson (166) -- 22
T4. Brandon Holt (109) -- 12
T4. Andre Ilagan (350) -- 12