My Recap of Kalamazoo 18s Championships; Dolehide, Li and Blanch Reach Pro Circuit Finals; Ecarma Out at Louisville; Kenin Advances to Second Straight WTA Premier Semifinal; College Park ITF Grade 1 Wild Cards

The final two articles on last week's USTA National Championships were posted today at the Tennis Recruiting Network. I covered Zachary Svajda's victory over Govind Nanda in the best-of-five boys 18s final in Kalamazoo and Rhiannon Potkey has the details on Katie Volynet's win over Emma Navarro in the girls 18s championship match in San Diego. Both articles also include coverage of the double finals, with Martin Damm and Toby Kodat and Abigail Forbes and Alexa Noel earning US Open main draw wild cards with their victories.

The two USTA Pro Circuit events this week in the United States end on Saturday rather than the customary Sunday finish, and three Americans will be vying for titles.  Wild card Caroline Dolehide, who won the silver medal in singles and gold medal in doubles at the Pan Am Games earlier this month, advanced to the final of the $60,000 tournament in Concord Massachusetts, beating qualifier Olga Govortsova of Belarus 7-6(2), 6-4.  She will face Ann Li, also unseeded this week, who advanced to her second straight $60K final with a 2-6, 6-1, 6-4 win over Usue Arconada.

At the $25,000 men's tournament in Memphis, Ulises Blanch has reached the final, where he'll face top seed Roberto Cid of the Dominican Republic. Blanch, the No. 5 seed, defeated No. 6 seed Alex Sarkissian(Pepperdine) 6-3, 6-2, while Cid, the former All-American at the University of South Florida, got by No. 7 seed Daniel Nguyen(USC) 6-4, 4-6, 6-2.

No. 2 seeds Ian Dempster(NC State/Wake Forest) and Korey Lovett(Alabama/Central Florida) won the doubles title in Memphis, beating No. 4 seeds Harrison Adams(Texas A&M) and Alexander Cozbinov(UNLV) of Moldova 6-2, 6-1 in the final.

The University of Louisville has fired men's head coach Rex Ecarma, two months after placing him on leave while an investigation was in progress. Ecarma, the head coach at Louisville for 29 years, was under scrutiny for his "treatment of student-athletes," according to the suspension letter that was obtained by the Louisville Courier-Journal. This article from WDRB, quoting a Louisville press release, says Ecarma will be paid according to his contract, which runs through 2023.

Sonya Kenin has beaten her second WTA No. 1 in two weeks, advancing to Saturday's semifinals in Cincinnati when Naomi Osaka retired trailing 6-4, 1-6, 2-0. Kenin had beaten Ashleigh Barty last week in Toronto, which allowed Osaka to reclaim the No. 1 position. Regardless of how she fares in the semifinals against either Venus Williams or Madison Keys, Kenin will make her WTA Top 20 debut on Monday.

I'll again be covering the ITF Grade 1 Prince George's County International Junior Tennis Championships in College Park Maryland beginning Monday with the start of the main draw. Qualifying begins Saturday with two rounds and will finish on Sunday with one round. The order of play and the draws are available here.

The wild cards have been distributed as follows:
Boys:
Muhammad Dossani
Ekansh Kumar
Samir Banerjee
Trinity Greer
Hayden Postin
Hugo Hashimoto
Luke Casper
Cash Hanzlik

Girls:
Elise Wagle
Carson Tanguilig
Nishitha Saravanan
Clervie Ngounoue
Ashlyn Krueger
Tsehay Driscoll
Alison Bach
Noa Boyd