US Boys Lead Great Britain 4-2 after First Day of Paul Hutchins Trophy; All-American Semifinals at Tulsa $25K; USTA Player Development Announces Coaching Fellowships

The first day of the Paul Hutchins Trophy, the newly established competition between Great Britain's and the United States' junior boys held in conjunction with the ATP 500 at Queen's Club, ended with the US team leading 4 to 2.  The US won three of four singles matches, while the two doubles matches were split.  The results are below, with the second and final day of competition, which will again feature four singles matches but only one doubles match, is Saturday.

Martin Damm(USA) d. Blu Baker(GBR) 6-3, 6-2
Arthur Fery(GBR) d. Toby Kodat(USA) 7-6(4), 6-2
Eliot Spizzirri(USA) d. James Story(GBR) 6-3, 6-3
Will Grant(USA) d. Oscar Weightman(GBR) 7-5, 2-6, 6-3

Damm/Kodat d. Baker/Fery 7-6(4), 5-7, 12-10
Story/Weightman d. Grant/Spizzirri 6-4, 4-6, 10-8

The semifinals are set at the $25,000 ITF World Tennis Tour tournament in Tulsa Oklahoma, with two former UCLA stars meeting in the top half and two longtime junior rivals facing off in the bottom half.

Top seed Maxime Cressy, who played No. 1 for UCLA this past year as a senior, will take on No. 4 seed Martin Redlicki, who played No. 1 for the Bruins in 2018, his senior year. Cressy defeated Ohio State rising junior John McNally 6-7(5), 7-6(2), 6-4 in three hours and 47 minutes on the hottest day of the year in Tulsa. It was the second day in a row that McNally's match time had exceeded three hours and 20 minutes. Redlicki needed only an hour and 18 minutes to beat No. 6 seed Gijs Brouwer of the Netherlands 6-3, 6-3, so it will be interesting to see what kind of an advantage that gives him on Saturday. Cressy and Redlicki met late last year in the quarterfinals of a $25K in Waco, with Cressy winning 6-4, 6-4. 

Unseeded Sam Riffice, the rising Florida sophomore, extended his winning streak to eight matches with a 6-2, 6-1 win over No. 3 seed Alexander Sarkissian(Pepperdine). Riffice, who won last week's $25K in Wichita, will face wild card and Tulsa resident Zeke Clark, a rising senior at Illinois. Clark, who reached his first Pro Circuit semifinal with a 6-1, 6-4 win over Nick Chappell(TCU), lost to Riffice 6-4, 6-4 in the second round in Wichita last week. They met three times in ITF Junior Circuit play back in 2014, with Riffice winning all three, twice needing three sets.

At the $25,000 ITF World Tennis Tour women's tournament in Denver, top seed Usue Arconada avenged her loss to Vicky Duval last week in Sumter by earning a 7-6(4), 2-6, 6-3 victory today in the quarterfinals. Arconada will face wild card Sophie Whittle(Gonzaga), who continued her stellar play this week with a 6-1, 6-4 win over Hayley Carter(North Carolina). Another wild card, 29-year-old Alexa Glatch, advanced to the semifinals, beating No. 7 seed Sanaz Marand(UNC) 4-6, 7-6(6), 6-3 in two hours and 50 minutes. Glatch's opponent in the semifinals is 19-year-old Gergana Topalova of Bulgaria, who beat qualifier Petia Arshinkova of Bulgaria 3-6, 6-2, 6-4.

Seventeen-year-old Karina Miller had played only one ITF Pro Circuit match prior to this week, with the Ann Arbor resident losing in the first round of qualifying at the $100,000 Dow Tennis Classic in Midland last year. The 2020 University of Michigan recruit has won five matches, including two qualifying matches, this week at the women's $15,000 WTT tournament at the USTA's National Campus in Lake Nona to reach the semifinals. Miller, who needed a wild card into qualifying, moved into the semifinals when 16-year-old Connie Ma retired trailing 6-4, 3-0. Miller will face No. 2 seed Tori Kinard, who beat 14-year-old Eleana Yu 6-0, 6-3. Top seed Grace Min, a 6-3, 6-1 winner over Sofia Sewing(Miami), will face Virginia rising freshman Natasha Subhash, the No. 4 seed, who beat Kimmi Hance 6-2, 6-1.

The only American remaining at the men's $15,000 WTT tournament in Lake Nona is No. 7 seed Strong Kirchheimer(Northwestern), who beat No. 4 seed Paul Oosterbaan(Georgia) 6-0, 6-3. He will play No. 2 seed Ricardo Rodriguez of Venezuela in the semifinals. In the top half, No. 6 seed Diego Hidalgo(Florida) of Ecuador will face No. 8 seed Alan Kohen of Argentina.

USTA Player Development announced yesterday six fellowships for college coaching and one for performance analytics. Below is the USTA's release.

ORLANDO, Fla., June 20, 2019 – The USTA today announced the six recent college graduates taking part in the USTA Player Development Fellowship program this summer:

Professional Coaching Fellows:

Jaime Barajas, a former Mountain West Conference Player of the Year and now volunteer assistant coach at Utah State University.

Leah Bush, a four-year letter-winner at NCAA Division III Williams College, where she was a part of its 2016-17 NCAA Championship team.

Nick Castro, currently an assistant women's coach at the University of the Pacific and former player and Kinesiology major at Fresno State.

Aslina Chua, a four-year player and pre-med major at Michigan State, where she played No. 1 singles as a senior.

Rachel Pierson, a former singles and doubles All-American at Texas A&M, the first player in program history to earn singles and doubles All-America honors. 

Performance Analytics Fellow:
Kevin Huang, a recent materials and science engineering graduate from the University of Illinois. 

The Fellowship program, which begins Monday and runs through the 2019 US Open, is structured to provide significant experiential training and opportunity for independent research in the field of professional tennis coaching. The program is based out of the USTA National Campus at Lake Nona in Orlando, Fla., and includes traveling with a coaching mentor.