San Diego Grade 1 Recap: 2021 Easter Bowl 14s Champion Jovic Joins Three Seeds in ITF Semifinals; Unseeded Sarr Upsets No. 3 Godsick to Reach Boys Semis; Three Finalists Unseeded in 16s Division

©Colette Lewis 2022--
Indian Wells, CA--

As the Grade B1 FILA Easter enters its final weekend, there's still time to catch up on everything that happened at last week's Grade 1 in San Diego, with my recap of the victories by Learner Tien and Liv Hovde, as well as the doubles finals, available now at Tennis Recruiting Network.

The jump from 14s to the major level of the ITF Junior Circuit, took just a year for 2021 Easter Bowl 14s champion Iva Jovic, who advanced to Saturday's semifinals at the Grade B1 Easter Bowl with a 6-4, 6-4 win over 2021 16s champion Thea Rabman.

Wild card Jovic, who won the Junior Orange Bowl 14s in December, took advantage of the withdrawal of San Diego J1 champion Liv Hovde, her projected second round opponent, to reach the semifinals of a Grade 1 for the first time, just two weeks after capturing her first ITF singles at the Grade 4 in Las Vegas.

"I love this tournament, it's a really special tournament to me," said the 14-year-old Torrance California resident, who has now won ten consecutive Easter Bowl singles matches. "I wanted to do well again this year, so I'm happy I'm still in."

Jovic was able to navigate past Rabman by countering the 16-year-old's variety and playing her best on the key points.

"She's a crafty player and has a lot of shots that she can hit," Jovic said. "So it's tough to stay in rhythm. But I won the games that were important, when it was 4-all. It was a close match, and I was also kind of tired, because I had a long match yesterday."

Jovic was ahead of No. 16 seed Alexia Harmon 6-2, 5-3 and then lost seven consecutive games, going down two breaks in the third set. 

"She started playing a lot better, she wasn't giving me anything, and I was getting frustrated. That translated to the beginning of the third. I was like, right now, she's not beating you, you're beating yourself. So if you can get yourself together, you can still win, and yeah, I did, 7-5. Once I got one game, it was 1-3, and momentum kind of shifted to my side."

Jovic will face No. 4 seed Alexis Blokhina, who defeated unseeded Isabella Chhiv 6-4, 7-5.

The other girls semifinal will feature No. 2 seed Qavia Lopez and No. 3 seed Reese Brantmeier. Lopez breezed past No. 8 seed Ava Krug 6-1, 6-1 and Brantmeier ended the run of 13-year-old wild card Shannon Lam, the 2021 Easter Bowl 12s champion 6-4, 6-0. Brantmeier defeated Lopez 6-4, 6-3 in the first round of the Orange Bowl back in 2020.

The junior version of the Sunshine Double, a nickname Easter Bowl press aide Steve Pratt gave to the back-to-back California Grade 1 spring tournaments, is no longer a possibility, with No. 8 seed Alex Michelsen defeating San Diego J1 champion Learner Tien, the No. 15 seed, 6-4, 7-5.  

Tien, who was looking a little worse for wear after so many matches in the past two weeks, broke Michelsen serving for the match at 5-3, but failed to hold to send the match to a tiebreaker.

"I train with him all the time," said Michelsen, who is also at Tier One Academy in Irvine. "It was a lot of fun to play him, we know how our game styles match up against each other. In practice, it's pretty much a 50-50 split, so I knew the match would be 50-50 going in. I thought we both didn't play our best tennis, but I found a way. We both didn't serve very well. He did great last week, played a lot of matches and not a ton of rest, so maybe wasn't getting to every ball he usually gets to and making every shot, but he had a great week last week."

Michelsen will face unseeded Kyle Kang for the second week in a row, after Kang defeated qualifier Evan Wen 6-0, 6-2.  Kang, a finalist in San Diego, beat Michelsen 6-4, 6-4 in the first round.

"I'm glad it's the semifinal and not the first round," said the 17-year-old, who has verbally committed to Georgia for 2023. "I think I'll adjust my strategy a little bit, change things up a bit. Last week he totally outplayed me."

Last week Tien and Kang made a Grade 1 final for the first time. This week, Jelani Sarr is poised to do the same after the unseeded 17-year-old defeated No. 3 seed Nicholas Godscik 7-6(3), 6-3.

"I feel like this has been a long time coming," said Sarr, who defeated No. 6 seed Aidan Kim in the second round and No. 11 seed Aayush Bhat in the third round. "I've been working really hard and in this tournament I've felt good since the first match. It was time to start winning these big matches, because I've been there a lot, but I've never actually got those matches. But I'm starting to get them, so it's exciting."

Sarr said that his biggest improvement, now that he's fully recovered from the injuries that have plagued him, is maturing on and off the court.

"I've been competing extremely well these past matches," said Sarr, who trains at Van Der Meer Academy in South Carolina on the rare occasions that he's not at a tournament. "I know I have the game, it's just discipline and mental. I'm starting to getting to bed earlier, more professional on court, getting angry, but knowing what to do when you get angry. You don't need to show your opponent that you're getting upset, so I've been really, really working on that."

On Saturday, Sarr will play his fourth consecutive seed in No. 2 Nishesh Basavareddy, who defeated No. 9 seed Jonah Braswell 6-0, 6-3. Sarr still remembers their quarterfinal back draw match at the 2016 Easter Bowl.

"I actually played him in the 12s Easter Bowl," Sarr said. "He beat me 10-2 in the third, so I have to get my revenge. He was good back then too."

The semifinals will begin at 9:30 a.m. Saturday on courts 1-4, with courts 1 and 2 featuring live streaming via the Easter Bowl website.

The 16s singles finals will be played on courts 1 and 2 following those semifinals, with the ITF doubles finals to follow.

Three of the four doubles semifinals were decided in match tiebreakers on a scorching afternoon at Indian Wells Tennis Garden, with No. 2 seeds Aidan Kim and Michael Zheng the exceptions with their 6-4, 6-3 win over unseeded Brendan Boland and Nico Jamison. Boland and Jamison lost in singles qualifying, but signed in for doubles and after not one, but two teams withdrew, received entry and made the semifinals. 

Kim and Zheng will face No. 3 seeds Michelsen and Sebastian Gorzny, who ousted top seeds Godsick and Ethan Quinn 6-3, 1-6, 10-2.

Sophie Williams will be going for the Sunshine Double in doubles, with a different partner this week, after taking the San Diego J1 with Laura Smejkal of Slovenia. Playing with Blokhina, the unseeded pair defeated unseeded Ashton Bowers and Maya Joint 2-6, 6-4, 10-8 in this afternoon's semifinals.

They will face top seeds Hovde and Lopez, who overcame unseeded Natalie Block and Piper Charney 6-4, 3-6, 10-5.

The 16s singles and doubles championships are set for Saturday, with both boys finalists and one girls finalist unseeded.

William Manning of Raleigh North Carolina defeated Zhengqing Ji of San Diego, a No. 9 seed, 6-4, 6-4 today to advance to the boys 16s final. He will play Parashar Bharadwaj of Irvine California, who played the match of the day in the semifinals against No. 3 seed Cyrus Mahjoob. It took three hours and 45 minutes for Bharadwaj to earn the victory, but the effort of both competitors was heartily applauded by the crowd that filled the stands on the tournament's show court.

The girls 16s final will feature unseeded Sydney Jara, the reigning USTA G14s National Champion. Jara, from Wenham Massachusetts, defeated Aspen Schuman, a No. 9 seed, 6-1, 6-2. She will face No. 5 seed Valerie Glozman of Bellevue Washington, who beat unseeded Claire Zhang 6-2, 6-4. Glozman and Jara met in the first round of USTA G16s National Indoors last November, with Glozman taking a 6-0, 7-5 decision. 

The doubles finals in 16s will be played Saturday, with the girls championship to be decided between top seeds Stephanie Yakoff and Susanna Maltby and No. 5 seeds Conley Raidt and Saray Yli-Piipari.

The boys final will feature unseeded Mahjoob and Declan Galligan and top seeds Matthew Forbes and AJ Mercer.

For 16s draws and times, see the USTA Playtennis site.

There was sad news for the Easter Bowl tennis community at the beginning of the tournament, with word of the passing of longtime photographer Bob Kenas. With his son Dave Kenas, the two were fixtures in the desert every year, and Bob will be missed by all who connected with him over the years.  Steve Pratt prepared this article, with a link to his obituary, for the Easter Bowl website.