NCAA Men's Division I Super Regional Matchups Set; Osuigwe Reaches Final at Charleston $100K; Pielet, Bicknell Win ITF Delray Beach Grade 4 Titles; Suarez, Pitts and Cooper Also Claim ITF Titles

The inaugural Division I Super Regionals are almost set for the men, with only one of the 16 seeds not advancing, although a second is still a possibility.  Cal defeated No. 15 seed Illinois today 4-1 in Champaign, with the Bears now traveling to Texas to take on the second-seeded Longhorns next weekend.  Due to rain on Friday, the Texas A&M regional is a round behind, with No. 13 Aggies scheduled to take on Oklahoma Sunday in College Station, after they posted shutouts against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi and Arizona respectively.  The schedules for all the matches haven't been set yet, but will be either Friday May 10 or Saturday May 11.

There were no 4-3 matches in the men's second round, with the closest match Tennessee's 4-2 win over North Carolina State. The Volunteers took the doubles point and five first sets, but the Wolfpack fought back, sending five matches to a third set. Tennessee held on, with Adam Walton defeating Igor Saveljic 6-3, 6-7(4) 7-5 at line 2 for the clinching point.

Division I Men’s Super Regionals:
Ohio State[1]* v Columbia[16]
North Carolina[9] v USC[8]*
Virginia[5]* v Stanford[12]
Texas A&M[13] or Oklahoma v Wake Forest[4]*
Florida[3]* v Tennessee[14]
UCLA[11] v Baylor[6]*
Mississippi State[7]* v TCU[10]
Cal v Texas[2]*

*hosts

Only half of the women's Super Regional participants have been decided, with the other eight regional winners scheduled to be determined on Sunday, but one seed is already out, No. 11 Florida State, who lost to Central Florida 4-1 in Tallahassee tonight. Only one women's Super Regional matchup is set, with UCF playing No. 6 seed Pepperdine, shut out Cal today.

In first round matches today, there were two regional No. 3 seeds beating No. 2 seeds: UNLV defeated Texas Tech 4-3 and Arizona State defeated Illinois 4-0.  The closest second round match was No. 15 seed Oklahoma State's 4-3 win over Miami.

Top seeds Georgia, North Carolina and Stanford all breezed to 4-0 victories in their first round matches.

Women’s teams advancing to Super Regionals:
Michigan[16]
Vanderbilt[8]*
South Carolina[4]*
Kansas[14]
Central Florida
Pepperdine[6]*
Oklahoma State[15]
*hosts

See Championship Central at SLAM Tennis for the brackets and times for Sunday's matches.

Whitney Osuigwe is piling up the victories on the green clay, with the 17-year-old Floridian reaching her biggest final yet at the $100,000 ITF World Tennis Tour event in Charleston South Carolina. The unseeded Osuigwe, who won the $80,000 WTT tournament in Charlottesville Virginia last week, won her ninth match in a row today, beating No. 7 seed Kaja Juvan of Slovenia 2-6, 6-2, 6-4.  Osuigwe, who also came from a set down in the her second round win over No. 5 seed Lauren Davis, will play No. 2 seed and defending champion Taylor Townsend, a 6-1, 6-4 winner over wild card Emma Navarro. Osuigwe beat Townsend 6-3, 2-6, 6-3 in the quarterfinals last week in Charlottesville, while Townsend has a three-set win over Osuigwe in the quarterfinals of the Charleston tournament last year en route to the title.

Townsend and Asia Muhammad, the top seeds, won the doubles title, beating unseeded Madison Brengle and Lauren Davis 6-2, 6-2 in today's final.  Townsend and Muhammad also won the doubles title last week in Charlottesville and prior to that, Muhammad had taken a WTA title with Maria Sanchez in Mexico, so she is on a 12-match winning streak.

Five American juniors claimed singles titles this week on the ITF Circuit, and Will Grant and Tyler Zink won the doubles title at the Grade 2 in Italy.

The fourth-seeded Grant and Zink, the Easter Bowl ITF champions, defeated the unseeded Italian team of Francesco Maestrelli and Samuel Vincent Ruggeri  4-6, 6-4, 10-7 in the final. Zink, the No. 2 seed, and unseeded Mark Mandlik reached the quarterfinals in singles.

At the Grade 4 in Delray Beach Florida, No. 2 seed Blaise Bicknell defeated top seed Blu Baker of Great Britain 6-4, 6-1 in the final, and the 17-year-old Florida recruit dropped only one set in his six victories.

No. 11 seed Gianna Pielet, 16, won the girls title, beating unseeded Lara Schneider 6-4, 6-3 in the final. Pielet also lost just one set during her six matches.

Seventeen-year-old Lauren Cooper swept the titles at the Grade 4 in Namibia. The No. 4 seed, who didn't drop a set all week, defeated unseeded Leigh Van Zyl of South Africa 6-3, 6-2 in the final. She and Dakota Fordham, the top seeds in doubles, won the title with a 6-2, 6-2 win over Noa Dujardin of France and Ines Stephani of Belgium.

At the Grade 5 in Jamaica, 17-year-old Billy Suarez won his first ITF Junior Circuit singles title, with the No. 8 seed advancing to the final without dropping a set, and beating top seed John Chin of Jamaica 6-4, 6-4 for the title.  Sixteen-year-old Maya Pitts also won her first ITF singles title in Jamaica, with the No. 2 seed beating her doubles partner and top seed Mary Grace Armistead 6-3, 6-1 in the final. Pitts and Armistead, the top seeds, claimed the doubles title with a 6-3, 6-7(5), 10-8 win over unseeded Jordan Grayson and Jennifer Riester in an all-USA final.