August Aces; Twelve US Juniors Reach Final Round of US Open Qualifying; Gauff and McNally Advance in Women's Doubles; France Puts Three in Repentigny's Grade 1 Finals

My monthly column highlighting the top performances of this month is up today at the Tennis Recruiting Network, highlighting the achievements of juniors and former college players in professional and international junior events. There were so many with titles this month that I had to limit the level of the Pro Circuit titles I featured to that at $25,000 and above.

The first day of US Open Junior qualifying is complete at the Cary Leeds Tennis Center in the Bronx, with a dozen Americans reaching Saturday's final round.

The US girls winning matches today: Elvina Kalieva, Kailey Evans[13], Skyler Grishuk[3], Emma Jackson[11], Alexandra Yepifanova[9], Hibah Shaikh, Kylie Collins[14] and Qavia Lopez[WC].  Kalieva and Evans face off on Saturday, so at least one more American will reach the main draw from that match.

The US boys advancing are Aidan Mayo[WC], Cash Hanzlik[WC], Victor Lilov[WC] and Blaise Bicknell.  In the marquee match of the day, top qualifying seed Karlis Ozolins of Latvia again got the better of Micah Braswell, with the ITF Grade 1 College Park champion beating College Park finalist Braswell 7-5, 6-3.

At the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, wild cards Coco Gauff and Caty McNally won their first round women's doubles match, beating Julia Goerges of Germany and Katerina Siniakova of the Czech Republic 7-6(6), 6-2. Gauff and McNally were one of the August Aces for their title early this month at the WTA tournament in Washington DC. As the 2018 US Open girls champions, Gauff and McNally have now won six straight doubles matches at the USTA BJKNTC. Whitney Osuigwe, who has several major junior titles with McNally as her partner(and two Wimbledon girls doubles finals), is partnering with Taylor Townsend, and they beat the Canadian team of Bianca Andreescu and Sharon Fichman 6-2, 6-3. Danielle Collins and former Georgia star Ellen Perez of Australia took out No. 6 seeds Samantha Stosur of Australia and Shuai Zhang of China 1-6, 6-4, 6-4.

NCAA champions Keegan Smith and Maxime Cressy of UCLA lost to Juan Ignacio Londero of Argentina and Ricardas Berankis of Lithuania 6-4, 3-6, 6-3.

Friday’s third round singles matches featuring Americans:
Serena Williams[8] d. Karolina Muchova(CZE) 6-3, 6-2
Madison Keys[10] d. Sofia Kenin[20] 6-3, 7-5
Novak Djokovic[1](SRB) d. Denis Kudla 6-3, 6-4, 6-2

Saturday's third round singles matches featuring Americans:
Coco Gauff[WC] v Naomi Osaka[1](JPN)
Taylor Townsend[Q] v Sorana Cirstea(ROU)
Kristie Ahn[WC] v Jelena Ostapenko(LAT)

John Isner[14] v Marin Cilic[22](CRO)
Tennys Sandgren v Diego Schwartzman[20](ARG)

The finals are set at the ITF Grade 1 in Repentigny Canada, with the girls final an all-France affair.  Carole Monnet defeated unseeded Jada Bui of Canada 6-3, 6-1 and will face No. 7 seed  Elsa Jacquemot, who beat No. 6 seed Sohyun Park of Korea 6-4, 6-2.  France also has one of the boys finalists, in No. 4 seed Valentin Royer, who defeated Francesco Maestrelli of Italy 6-0, 6-2. Maestrelli's place in the US Open Junior qualifying was taken by alternate James Story of Great Britain. Royer will face No. 13 seed Leandro Riedi of Switzerland, who beat No. 10 seed Tristan Schoolkate of Australia 6-4, 6-3.