Eddie Herr Qualifiers in 12s, 14s and 16s Divisions; First Round of ITF J1 Eddie Herr Qualifying Complete; Lincer Reaches $15K Singles Final, Reed Wins Doubles Title

©Colette Lewis 2021--
Bradenton FL--

A perfect day for tennis saw the end of the qualifying for the younger divisions at the Eddie Herr International Junior Championships and the beginning of the qualifying for the ITF J1.

Clear skies, no wind and temperatures in the upper 60s was the backdrop, and with an absence of weather issues, all the younger qualifiers were free to enjoy the great weather, with all matches completed by 12:30 p.m. 

Below is the list of qualifiers. I have added the country name of each qualifier, information that is not available on the website. All qualifying draws can be found here.

Boys 12s:

Jae Jun Shin[1], Korea

Julian Zhang[8], USA

Amir Khan[14], USA

Qi Ao[6], USA

Levi Taylor[5], USA

Jaime Gomez Lopez[3], MEX

Matias Erices, USA

Victor Pignaton[2], BRA

Girls 12s: (finished Friday)

Camila de la Casas[1], PER

Meher Rao[7], USA

Briyana Ivanova, BUL

Luma Teixeira[6], USA

Zoe Vanina Doldan Vinales, USA

Aurora Lugo, PUR

Pepper Rickert[8], USA

Ji Yun Oh[2], KOR

Boys 14s:

Nathan Germino[1], USA

Rajat Shirur[12], USA

Keane Chambers, USA

Luise Ignacio Roble Flores[9], CHI

Nicolas Genereux[8], CAN

Venkat Rishi Batlanki, IND

Ryan Szilagy[14], USA

Jorge Andres Rodriguez Palacios[2], BOL

Girls 14s:

Vasilina Andronov[1], ISR

Cookie Jarvis-Tredgett, CAN

Dylan Gelber[4], CAN

Gretchen Wolfe[5], USA

Marianne Angel Gonzalez[11], MEX

Anna Maria Fedotova[3], DOM

Lillian Santos[8], USA

Zaire Clarke[2], USA

Boys 16s:

Jack Di Menna[13], USA

Arjan Mann, CAN

Kristian Thomas, CAN

Jack Ling[11], USA

Maxim Prunoiu, USA

Kaito Hanada, JPN

Raul de la Vega, BRA

Nathan Gold[2], USA

Girls 16s:

Stephanie Hylton, USA

Allie Bittner, USA

Ashikha Amalnathan, USA

Delanie Tribby[4], USA

Raphaelle Leroux[1], CAN

Lucia Donnelly[9], USA

Mollie Garcia[15], USA

Juhnyee See[11], USA

The J1 qualifying didn't feature any of the top nine seeds, who all received byes into Sunday's second round, and most of the 10-16 seeds advanced. The only exceptions in the girls draw was No. 11 seed Maya Iyengar, who gave a walkover to Abigail Thurmer, and No. 15 seed Violeta Martinez, who lost to Eleana Yu 6-0, 6-3.

In the boys draw, Landon Ardila picked up the only win over a 10-16 qualifying seed, beating No. 12 Meecah Bigun 6-3, 6-3.

Ardila, a 17-year-old from Texas, said he wasn't aware that the tournament was on clay, and had one hit on the Har-Tru before his first round match.

"Just the warmup this morning, that's about it," said Ardila, who had not played a match at the Eddie Herr before today. "I live in Dallas, and don't have clay at my club. It's a lot more grinding, you have to move a lot, be ready for the bad bounces. Flat serves, flat forehands aren't as effective, so you've got to hit heavier."

Ardila didn't play on the ITF Junior Circuit prior to this year, but his success this fall in two events in Texas, where he won the J5 in McKinney as a qualifier and made the final of the J4 in Corpus Christi, convinced him to sign up for the Eddie Herr.

"I played two ITFs in September and I did really well in those, so I decided to go the course of playing ITFs," Ardila said. "It's a huge tournament and a great chance to play some really good players. The first step is just to try to make main draw, get some ITF points. If I get there, I'll set some new goals."

Sunday's qualifying schedule for the J1 includes two rounds, with the first series of boys matches going out at 8:30 a.m., followed by the girls, then the boys final round and the girls final round.

The JA in Merida Mexico concludes tonight, with Linda and Brenda Fruhvirtova meeting for the girls singles title for the second consecutive week. Linda, the No. 3 seed, defeated No. 2 seed Petra Marcinko of Croatia 6-3, 6-3, while 14-year-old Brenda took out top seed Victoria Jimenez Kasintseva of Andorra 6-2, 4-6, 6-4. Last week in the final of the J1 in Guadalajara Mexico, Linda defeated Brenda 6-4, 7-6(5).

The boys singles final tonight features No. 4 seed Mili Poljicak of Croatia and No. 6 seed Adolfo Daniel Vallejo of Paraguay. 

The doubles finals were played last night, with Victoria Mboko and Kayla Cross, the No. 6 seeds beating Annabelle Xu and Naomi Xu 7-5, 6-2 in an all-Canadian championship match.  

The boys doubles title went to No. 6 seeds Juan Manuel La Serna and Lautaro Midon of Argentina, who defeated No. 7 seeds Joao Victor Couto Loureiro of Brazil and Henrique Rocha of Portugal 6-4, 0-6, 11-9 in the final.

Two American girls who entered ITF World Tennis Tour women's events rather than junior events have had impressive showings this week in Guatemala.

Sixteen-year-old Olivia Lincer, who has yet to crack the ITF Junior Circuit Top 100, has advanced to the final of the $15,000 tournament in Guatemala. The unseeded Lincer, who does not have a WTA ranking, will face top seed Hurricane Tyra Black in Saturday's all-US final. Fifteen-year-old Lexington Reed, who Lincer beat in the second round in singles, won the doubles title today, with Paris Corley(LSU). The unseeded Reed and Corley defeated the top seeds in the second round, and in the final beat No. 4 seeds Black and her partner Fernanda Astete of Chile 4-6, 7-6(1), 10-5.

Eddie Herr Qualifying Concludes Saturday for 12s, 14s, 16s with ITF J1 Qualifying Beginning; Top Four Girls Seeds Reach Semifinals at JA in Mexico

©Colette Lewis 2021--
Bradenton FL--

Mia Kupres and Nathalie Tauziat of Canada
heading home for the day

The final round of qualifying for the 12s, 14s and 16s division of the Eddie Herr International Championships is scheduled for Saturday morning, with the first round of qualifying for the ITF J1 also beginning at 8 a.m. on the clay courts of the IMG Academy.

Eight players will reach the 64-player main draw, which begins Monday. All final round qualifying matchups are available here, under the Round of 16 button.

The ITF J1 qualifying draws did not fill, with the top nine boys and top nine girls seeds receiving byes. Ellis Short and Preston Stearns are the top two seeds in the boys qualifying. Teddy Truwit and Brayden Michna are blue chips unseeded in the qualifying draw. Daniella Ben-Abraham, who was given a wild card, is the top seed in the girls qualifying, with Gabriella Broadfoot of South Africa the No. 2 seed. Eleana Yu, Bridget Stammel and Katie Codd are blue chips who are unseeded in the qualifying draw.

Although little has changed around the clay courts, the massive new construction on the East Campus has dramatically changed the look around the courts there. The tournament headquarters for the younger age groups remains in the indoor bubble where it has alway been, but with all the other ongoing construction surrounding it, the atmosphere in the area has completely changed.

I've gotten accustomed to all the changes on the West Campus, but wasn't prepared for all the demolition that has happened on the original grounds of the academy over the past two years.

The JA tournament this week in Merida Mexico is down to the semifinals, but with the matches being played so late there and no live scoring I can't stay up until the results are posted given the early start of the Eddie Herr tomorrow. The girls semifinals tonight featured all four of the top seeds, with No. 1 Victoria Jimenez Kasintseva of Andorra playing No. 4 seed Brenda Fruhvirtova of the Czech Republic and No. 3 seed Linda Fruhvirtova of the Czech Republic facing No. 2 seed Petra Marcinko of Croatia.  No. 6 seed Clervie Ngounoue was the only American to reach the quarterfinals; she lost to Jimenez Kasintseva last night 4-6, 6-4, 6-4.

The boys semifinals consist of No. 15 seed Lautaro Midon of Argentina versus No. 6 seed Adolfo Vallejo of Paraguay and an all-Croatian battle between No. 4 seed Mili Poljicak and No. 16 seed Dino Prizmic. Prizmic defeated No. 2 seed Leo Borg of Sweden 6-7(4), 6-3, 6-4 in last night's quarterfinals.

Happy Thanksgiving! Draws Posted for USTA National Indoor Championships, Beginning Friday at Eight Sites Across the Country

photo by Joseph Gonzalez, via unsplash

As is customary for me, I will be taking Thursday off for Thanksgiving, so I want to use tonight's post to wish everyone a happy holiday. Thanks for reading Zootennis, and I'll be back on Friday with updates on the JA going on this week in Merida Mexico, and the qualifying tournaments at the Eddie Herr.

The USTA National Indoor Championships are returning after a year's absence, with matches beginning Friday at eight sites--one for each age group and gender. 

Below are the top eight seeds in each division; the 64-player draws mean two singles matches a day on Friday and Sunday, with the finals scheduled for Monday.

B12s, Pendleton IN

1. Colin McPeek
2. Michael Antonius
3. Izyan Ahmad
4. Erik Schinnerer
5. Mateo Pouso
6. Anish Poojari
7. Akshay Mirmira
8. Safir Azam

G12s, Manchester MA

1. Sydney Barnhart
2. Nancy Lee
3. Sophie Suh
4. Ellery Mendell
5. Carrie-Ann Ho
6. Reagan Levine
7. Aubrey Meis
8. Anjani Vickneswaran

B14s, Chicago

1. Nicholas Patrick

2. Ronit Karki

3. Dominick Mosejczuk

4. Evan Sharygin

5. Zachary Cohen

6. Roman Sancilio

7. Jon Gamble

8. Andre Alcantara

G14s, Toledo

1. Laima Frosch

2. Capucine Jauffret

3. Emerey Gross

4. Leena Friedman

5. Olivia Cutone

6. Addison Lanton

7. Calla McGill

8. Paige Wygodzki

B16s, Nicholasville KY

1. Kaveh Brian Taheri

2. Aaron Sandler

3. William Hseih

4, Kase Schinnerer

5. Declan Galligan

6. Noah McDonald

7. Rahul Sachdev

8. Carson Baker

G16s, Minneapolis

1. Amber Yin

2. Saray Yli-piipari

3. Jessica Bernales

4. Ava Bruno

5. Elena Daskalova

6. Angela Huang

7. Clara Zou

8. Victoria Zhao

B18s, Overland Park KS

1. Alexander Visser

2. Marko Mesarovic

3. Grant Lothringer

4. Chad Miller

5. Vignesh Gogineni

6. Connor Smillie

7. Eric Li

8. Jason Shuler

G18s, Indianapolis

1. Kaitlyn Carnicella

2. Theadora Rabman

3. Charlotte Owensby

4. Maddy Zampardo

5. Alice Xu

6. Vivian Miller

7. Stephanie Yakoff

8. Reese Miller

ITF Junior Circuit Returns to Australia for Traralgon J1, First Junior Slam of 2022; Lilov Late Withdrawal at Merida JA, Other Americans Advance to Round of 16

The ITF Junior Circuit will return to Australia for the first time in two years next January, with entries now open for the J1 in Traralgon and the Australian Open Junior Championships in Melbourne.

Beginning on January 14th, the J1 in Traralgon will serve as a warmup event for the Australian Open Junior Championships, after both tournaments were canceled in 2021 due to the pandemic. As was the case in 2020, the draws will be 64 in the main draw and 32 in qualifying. The deadline for entries is December 7, just two weeks from today.

The Australian Open Junior Championships, which were not played in 2021 due to the pandemic, will begin on Saturday January 22 and conclude on Saturday January 29. The entry deadline is also December 7, and the draws are the usual 64-player main draw and 32-play qualifying. 

I assume, given the recent announcement from Tennis Australia that all players in the men and women's draws must be vaccinated to participate will also extend to the junior players, but that information is not part of the fact sheet published today.

In any case, the return of the Australian Open Junior Championships is a positive development in returning the 2022 calendar to its usual rhythm and structure, after two years of cancellations and accommodations due the pandemic.

The seeds took to the courts today at the ITF JA in Merida Mexico, after receiving byes in the first round.

Wimbledon boys finalist Victor Lilov, who was the top seed when the draws were released Sunday night, withdrew, with a lucky loser taking his position at the top of the draw. Lilov has also withdrawn from the Orange Bowl next month.

Although matches always extend late into the night in Mexico and all of the second round scores are not posted, most of the seeds have advanced to Wednesday's round of 16. A few did not; Ryan Colby defeated No. 12 seed Luka Mikrut of Croatia 7-6(5), 6-2 and wild card Luca Lamaitre Vilchis of Mexico beat No. 13 seed Joao Victor Couto Loureiro of Brazil 6-7(4), 7-6(9), 6-3. Alexander Blockx of Belgium took out No. 8 seed Kalin Ivanovski of Macedonia 6-2, 2-6, 6-2.

No. 2 seed Leo Borg of Sweden advanced, as did No.3 seed Gonzalo Bueno of Peru.

Four US girls have advanced to the round of 16, including unseeded wild card Qavia Lopez, Liv Hovde, No. 6 seed Clervie Ngounoue and No. 11 seed Alexis Blokhina. 

Lopez defeated No. 16 seed Amelie Van Impe of Belgium 6-2, 6-1 and Hovde repeated last month's victory in the final of the ITF JB1 in Nicholasville, beating No. 14 seed Marina Stakusic of Canada 6-3, 6-4. Blokina defeated Lara Smejkal of Slovenia 6-2, 6-3 and Ngounoue downed Alejandra Cruz of Mexico 6-0, 6-1.

Iyengar, Goetz Sweep Titles on ITF Junior Circuit; Puerto Vallarta Challenger Draws 14 Americans; Tiafoe Replaces Fritz on US Davis Cup Team

In addition to the ITF J1 in Guadalajara and the J5 in San Diego last week, there were 17 other tournaments on the ITF Junior Circuit, with Americans claiming six titles, to add to the three they won in San Diego and the boys doubles title in Mexico.

Fourteen-year-old Maya Iyengar took the singles and doubles titles at the J4 in Guatemala, her first in singles and her second doubles, having won her first earlier this month in El Salvador. Seeded No. 5, Iyengar defeated top seed Ria Bhakta 6-3, 6-2 in an all-American final. Iyengar and partner Jaquelyn Ogunwale of Great Britain won the doubles title, with the No. 3 seeds beating top seeds Bhakta and Maria Castano of the Dominican Republic 4-6, 6-4, 10-8 in the final. That first set in the doubles final was the only set Iyengar, a blue chip from Arizona, lost during the week. She had lost to Bhakta 6-2, 6-0 in the singles semifinals in El Salvador two weeks ago. 

Sixteen-year-old Taylor Goetz swept the singles and doubles titles last week at a J5 in Pakistan, and this week she repeated that accomplishment at another J5 in Islamabad.  Goetz, the No. 2 seed, defeated her doubles partner and top seed Abhilasha Bista of Nepal 6-1, 6-0 in the final, and lost only six games total in her four singles victories. Goetz and Bista, the top seeds in doubles, defeated No. 2 seeds Olga Sorochkina and Ekaterina Suvorova of Russia 6-1, 6-2 for their second consecutive title. 

Eighteen-year-old Mujtaba Ali-Khan won his first ITF Junior Circuit title at the J5 in Pakistan as a qualifier. The four-star from Illinois  defeated the No. 2 seed in the second round and No. 4 seed Amir Asylkozhaev of Russia 7-6(3), 6-3 in the final. 

At the J4 in Egypt, 17-year-old Baylen Brown won the girls doubles title, partnering with Francesca Pace of Italy. The No. 4 seeds defeated the unseeded Egyptian team of Kenzy Sherif Elhamrawy and Sama Hassan Hindawy 6-2, 6-1 in the final. Brown now has two doubles titles on the ITF Junior Circuit.

The last of the USTA Pro Circuit Challengers was the tournament in Champaign last week, but 14 Americans have travelled to Puerto Vallarta Mexico this week for the ATP Challenger 80, trying to earn more points before the Australian Open entry cutoff next month. 

Two Americans qualified with wins today: Christian Langmo(Miami) and Govind Nanda(UCLA).  The seeded Americans this week are Ernesto Escobedo[4], Michael Mmoh[5], and Christian Harrison[6]. Last week's Austin $25K champion Zachary Svajda is in the field, as are Aleks Kovacevic(Illinois), Donald Young, Alex Rybakov(TCU), Nick Chappell(TCU), Alex Sarkissian(Pepperdine), JC Aragone(Virginia), Michael Redlicki(Duke/Arkansas) and wild card Milledge Cossu, a sophomore at Purdue. Former TCU star Jerry Lopez received a wild card, as did ITF No. 1 junior Juncheng Jerry Shang of China.

University of Kentucky junior Liam Draxl of Canada also qualified into the main draw today.

Pablo Cuevas of Uruguay is the top seed, with Daniel Altmaier of Germany seeded No. 2. They are No. 95 and No. 98 in the ATP rankings.

The USTA announced on Saturday that Frances Tiafoe would be replacing Taylor Fritz as a member of the US Davis Cup team, which begins competition Friday in Italy. The USTA announcement:

Frances Tiafoe to Replace Taylor Fritz for U.S. Davis Cup Team in 2021 Finals

November 20, 2021 – Frances Tiafoe will replace Taylor Fritz for the U.S. Davis Cup Team in the 2021 Davis Cup by Rakuten Finals November 25-December 5.

 

Tiafoe, 23, is ranked No. 38 and joins a team with No. 24 John Isner, No. 26 Reilly Opelka, former world singles No. 8 and doubles No. 2 Jack Sock and current world doubles No. 4 Rajeev Ram.

 

Team USA will begin its quest for a record-extending 33rd title in Turin, Italy, with group matches against the home Italians on November 26 and Colombia on November 28. Each matchup is a best-of-three tie featuring two singles and one doubles match. Should the U.S. advance out of its group, it would play a Quarterfinal tie in Turin to potentially advance to the semifinals and Finals in Madrid, Spain. The full schedule and field can be viewed on the Davis Cup website.

 

McNally, Svajda Claim First Pro Circuit Titles; Sarmiento Wins in East Lansing; Kozlov Captures Another Challenger in Champaign; JA in Mexico Begins Monday, with Lilov Top Seed

John McNally in today's final
photo credit: Scott Gerber/OhioTennisZone.com

Two Kalamazoo champions won their first USTA Pro Circuit titles today at $25,000 tournaments in Columbus Ohio and Austin Texas as the pro season concluded today in four tournaments across the country.

John McNally, who won the Kalamazoo 16s singles and doubles titles in 2014, defeated recent Ohio State teammate JJ Tracy today in a three-hour final at the Ty Tucker Tennis Center 4-6, 7-6(2) 6-3. Buckeye sophomore Tracy, a wild card, had two match points with No. 7 seed McNally serving at 3-5 in the second set, but the 23-year-old from Cincinnati held, broke, and rode that momentum through the second set tiebreaker and the final set for the title. McNally had previously reached a Pro Circuit final once before, in July of 2019, at the $25,000 tournament in Iowa City, losing to Alex Rybakov in a third set tiebreaker. 

Zachary Svajda, who is the reigning Kalamazoo 18s champion and also won that title in 2019, had never reached a Pro Circuit final prior to today. The No. 2 seed, Svajda was up against lucky loser Eduardo Nava(Wake Forest), who also was competing in his first Pro Circuit final. Nava's ranking of 1586 was over 1000 places below that of Svajda, who is at 442, but the 24-year-old senior forced a third set before falling 6-4, 4-6, 6-4.

Another three-set final was played at the $15,000 tournament in East Lansing Michigan, with former USC All-American Raymond Sarmiento winning his first Pro Circuit singles title since 2016. The 29-year-old Sarmiento, seeded No. 1, came back to beat unseeded University of Kentucky junior Gabriel Diallo of Canada 4-6, 6-3, 6-4.

At the $25,000 women's Pro Circuit tournament in Naples Florida, unseeded Nefisa Berberovic of Bosnia defeated No. 4 seed Sujeong Jang of Korea 7-5, 2-6, 7-4 in a three-hour and 26 minute final.

No. 8 seed Stefan Kozlov defeated No. 4 seed Aleks Vukic of Australia 5-7, 6-3, 6-4 today in the final of the ATP Challenger 80 in Champaign Illinois, earning his third Challenger title since September. A day after clinching the USTA's Australian Open wild card, Kozlov was able to refocus, although he was down a set and break before rallying for the win. Kozlov had beaten Vukic in straight sets in the final of the Charlottesville Challenger two weeks ago, then drew him again in the first round of the Knoxville Challenger last week. Kozlov won that match 7-5 in the third, so the 23-year-old from Florida certainly knew that Vukic was dangerous, especially with the home crowd behind the former University of Illinois All-American. But after getting broken to give Vukic a 2-1 lead, Kozlov won four straight games to reassert himself. The third set was not pretty, understandable with both players at the end of four consecutive weeks of Challenger competition, and Kozlov could not consolidate his breaks until the final game, when he held after breaking Vukic for the third time in the set.

Kozlov will move to 159 in the ATP rankings, still well below his career-high of 115 back in February of 2017, but after starting last year at 431, the 2015 Kalamazoo 18s finalist has to be happy with the trajectory of his ranking now.

Qualifying is complete and the draws are out for the JA in Merida Mexico, with 14 US boys and 12 US girls in the main draw. 

Wimbledon boys finalist Victor Lilov is the top seed and the only seeded American boy. With the 48-draw, he and the other 15 seeds have a bye in the first round. The other US boys are Azuma Visaya, Sebastian Sec, Ryan Colby, Cooper Williams, Luca Hotze, Yannik Rahman, Ellis Short(who received a special exemption into the main draw for reaching the doubles final at the J1 in Guadalajara), wild card Jackson Armistead, Timothy Phung and qualifiers Nicholas Steiglehner, Preston Stearns, Leanid Boika and Alexander Aney.

ITF No. 1 junior Victoria Jimenez Kasintseva of Andorra is the No. 1 seed. I was surprised to see her name at the top of the draw, as she has pulled out of next month's Orange Bowl and was playing in the semifinals of the WTA 125 in Montevideo Uruguay yesterday. But as a seed, she won't play until Tuesday, so she may have decided to make the trip.

Czech Linda Fruhvirtova, who won the J1 yesterday in Guadalajara, accepted a wild card into the JA. She was initially accepted into the women's $60K in Brazil and so was automatically withdrawn from Merida. Qavia Lopez also received a wild card; she was entered in a $15K in Guatemala and she too was automatically withdrawn from the Merida event this week.

The US girls in the main draw, in addition to Lopez, are Sonya Macavei, Liv Hovde, Clervie Ngounoue[6], Ava Krug, Madeleine Jessup, Alexia Harmon, Alexis Blokhina[11], Daniella Ben-Abraham, Krystal Blanch, Mia Slama and Nevena Carton.