Frodin and Hance Reach Quarterfinals at Australian Open Junior Championships; Poznick Advances in Singles and Doubles at Les Petits As; Karki, Johnson Post Wins at Naples M15; Liutova, Brady Through at W100 San Diego

Seventeen-year-olds Thea Frodin and Keaton Hance begin their final year of ITF Junior Circuit competition with their first junior slam singles quarterfinals after picking up straight-sets victories Thursday at the Australian Open Junior Championships.

Frodin, seeded No. 8, defeated unseeded Antonina Sushkova of Ukraine 6-4, 7-5, while Hance, the No. 4 seed, got past unseeded Simone Massellani of Italy 6-0, 6-4. 

Frodin will face No. 13 seed Mariia Makarova of Russia Friday(tonight in the United States), with Hance's opponent No. 11 seed Kuan-Shou of Taiwan. 

No. 6 seed Xinran Sun of China, last week's Traralgon J300 champion, will play unseeded Ekaterina Tupitsyna in the other quarterfinal in the top half. No. 10 seed Kanon Sawashiro of Japan faces No. 3 seed Ksenia Efremova of France and No. 11 seed Yushan Shao of China will play unseeded Rada Zolotareva of Russia in the bottom half quarterfinals.

Unseeded Kai Thompson of Hong Kong faces No. 8 seed Zangar Nurlanuly of Kazakhstan in the top quarterfinal, with the survivor playing the Hance-Chen winner. 

In the bottom half, No. 5 seed Jamie Mackenzie of Germany, a TCU signee, will face No. 3 seed Ryo Tabata of Japan and No. 2 seed and Traralgon champion Luis Guto Miguel of Brazil will play No. 7 seed Ziga Sesko of Slovenia.

Miguel and Sesko are the only quarterfinal opponents who have met before, with Miguel beating Sesko twice last year, in the quarterfinals of the J300 in Belgium and the semifinals of the J300 in Canada. Miguel won the title at both events.

There are no Americans left in doubles, which is extremely rare, with at least one American boy claiming the Australian Open doubles title every year from 2022 through 2025, and at least one US girl winning in three of the last four years.

Thursday's third round matches featuring Americans:

Keaton Hance[4] d. Simone Massellani(ITA) 6-0, 6-4

Thea Frodin[8] d. Antonina Sushkova(URK) 6-4, 7-5

Doubles quarterfinals:

Ymerali Ibraimi and Cooper Kose[WC](AUS) d. Vihaan Reddy and Juan Miguel Bolivar Idarraga(COL) 6-2, 6-4

Connor Doig(RSA) and Dimitar Kisimov(BUL) d. Keaton Hance and Tanishk Konduri[4] 7-6(5), 7-6(4) 

lena and Jana Kovackova[1](CZE) d. Capucine Jauffret and Tahila Kokkinis(AUS) 6-2, 6-2

Mariia Makarova and Rada Zolotareva(RUS) d. Thea Frodin and Anastasija Cvetkovic(SRB)[3] 6-4, 7-5 

Tereza Hermanova and Denisa Zoldakova(CZE) d. Melije Clarke and Nancy Lee 6-4, 6-3

Jessica Pegula lost to Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan 6-3, 7-6(7) in the women's semifinals, ending the string of American women in a slam final at five.

Christian Harrison and Neal Skupski(LSU) of Great Britain will play in the men's doubles final after beating the winners of the last two slams, Marcel Granollers of Spain and Horacio Zeballos of Argentina, 6-3, 7-6(7).  They will play the Australian wild card team of Jason Kubler and Marc Polmans in Saturday's final. 

The quarterfinals are set for at the Les Petits As in Tarbes France, with unseeded Nadia Poznick the sole American remaining in singles. 

Poznick, a blue chip from Ann Arbor, beat Ania Curuia of Romania 6-1, 3-6, 6-2 today in the third round. No. 16 seed Anna Kapanadze, who won the title last week in Bolton England, played top seed Elizaveta Anikina of Estonia in the only girls match that  featured two seeds, with Anikina rebounding for a 3-6, 6-2, 6-3 win.

No. 15 seed Rex Kulman lost to qualifier Richard Mitchell of Switzerland 6-4, 6-2.

Poznick will face No. 10 seed Aleksandra Karabanova of Russia in the quarterfinals. 

Poznick will play in the doubles semifinals Friday with international partners. Poznick and Beata Maresova of the Czech Republic, who are unseeded, will play the unseeded pair of Varvara Makarova and Ildana Zaripova of Russia in the semifinals.

The unseeded American pair of Daniel Garadality and David Bender have also reached the doubles semifinals, where they will play the unseeded Japanese pair of Reita Yamanaka and Lyoma Hotelier.

Live streaming and live scoring can be found here.

At the M15 this week in Naples Florida, both 18-year-old Ronit Karki and 16-year-old wild card Andrew Johnson have reached the quarterfinals of an ITF men's World Tennis Tour tournament for the first time with wins in the second round today. 

Johnson, who opted to skip the Australian Open Junior this year, defeated qualifier Adam Lynch(Barry) 6-2, 6-1; Lynch had beaten top seed Tristan McCormick(Notre Dame, Georgia) in the first round. Johnson sill play No. 8 seed Will Grant(Florida) Friday.

Stanford signee Karki, who received entry via the iTF's Junior Reserve program, beat No. 4 seed Sebastian Gima of Romania 7-5, 7-5 and will play Ryan Colby(USC, Georgia) in the quarterfinals.

Several notable results from the W100 in San Diego, with 15-year-old qualifier Kristina Liutova beating Juliet Pareja 6-2, 6-3 in the first round and then getting a 3-2 first set retirement win over No. 7 seed Arianne Hartono(Ole Miss) of the Netherlands in the second round today. She will face either No. 2 seed Elli Mandlik or qualifier Ema Burgic(Baylor) of Bosnia.

And former UCLA star Jennifer Brady, who had been out for over two years due to injury, has won her first two matches, beating Katarina Jokic(Georgia) of Serbia 6-4, 0-6, 6-3 in the first round and No. 8 seed Kayla Day 6-4, 6-2 in the second round today.  Brady will play either LSU sophomore Cadence Brace of Canada, the No. 3 seed, or wild card Alexis Nguyen, a North Carolina signee, in Fridays' quarterfinals.

Also through to a quarterfinal meeting are No. 6 seed Mary Stoiana(Texas A&M) and LSU sophomore Kayla Cross of Canada.