Stearns Falls Just Short of First WTA Title; Ohio State Men Beat Michigan, Tennessee Tops South Carolina; Babos Downs Osuigwe for Jackson $25K Title; Collins and Krawczyk Win Charleston Doubles Title; Tiafoe Claims ATP 250 in Houston

According to John Parsons of the No-ad No-problem blog and podcast, the last time both NCAA champions reached the ATP and WTA Top 100 in the year after they won the titles was 2013.

Singles champions Nicole Gibbs of Stanford and Blaz Rola of Ohio State went on to reach the the Top 100 in 2014; Gibbs in September of 2014, Rola in April of 2014. 

2022 NCAA men's singles champion Ben Shelton's meteoric rise to the Top 100 (he's now at a career-high 39 in the ATP rankings) has overshadowed that of 2022 NCAA women's singles(and team) champion Peyton Stearns, but Stearns is now there, less than a year after earning her title. (Coincidentally, both the 2013 and 2022 NCAA champions won their titles in Champaign). Stearns reached her first WTA semifinal and final this week at the WTA 250 in Bogota Colombia, in elevation and on clay, dropping the final today against defending champion and No. 2 seed Tatjana Maria of Germany 6-3, 2-6, 6-4.

Stearns, a 21-year-old from Ohio, is now up to No. 89 in the WTA live rankings, which assures her a place in the main draw in Roland Garros. According to Parsons, Stearns has reached the WTA Top 100 more quickly than any women's NCAA singles champion since Florida's Lisa Raymond in 1992.

In the two Division I matches between Top 10 men's teams today, No. 3 Ohio State defeated No. 4 Michigan 4-2 and No. 9 Tennessee defeated No. 5 South Carolina 6-1, both on the road.

Ohio State won the doubles point, with victories at lines 2 and 3, and took a 3-0 lead when JJ Tracy beat Patrick Maloney at line 3 and James Trotter, who is undefeated in dual match play this year, defeated Gavin Young at line 4. The fourth point proved to be harder to come by for the Buckeyes, with Michigan's Ondrej Styler getting a 7-6(15!), 6-4 win over Cannon Kingsley at line 2 and Andrew Fenty beating Justin Boulais 3-6, 6-4, 6-4 to make it 3-2. Michigan, who had lost five first sets, forced third sets in three matches, but utimately they could manage only one victory, Fenty's, with Jack Anthrop defeating Jacob Bickersteth at line 6 6-4, 4-6, 6-1 to clinch the win.  Ohio State's Alexander Bernard and Michigan's  Nino Ehrenschneider were at 5-5 in third when red shirt freshman Anthrop delivered Ohio State's fourth point.

It's the second win for Ohio State over Michigan this year, and likely guarantees the Buckeyes another Big Ten regular season title. For more on the match, see this article from ohiostatebuckeyes.com.

Tennessee, which started the season with several disappointing losses, and dropped matches to Auburn and Georgia during SEC play, has been gathering momentum in the past few weeks, beating Kentucky last Sunday and now South Carolina, bolstering their chances for a Top 8 seed in the NCAA Team Championships. 

All three doubles matches went to tiebreakers, with Tennessee winning two of them, at lines 2 and 3 to get the first point. The Volunteers then took the next three points, all in straight sets, with Shusuke Mitsui winning at line 4, Johannus Monday at line 1 and, with the clinch, Angel Diaz at line 5.

See utsports.com for the recap and box score.

At the $25,000 women's USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Jackson Mississippi, former WTA Top 25 player Timea Babos of Hungary defeated No. 2 seed Whitney Osuigwe 7-5, 7-5 today to claim her first singles title since 2018, when she won an WTA 250 in Taiwan. Babos the No. 4 seed, has fallen to 326 in the WTA rankings, but this win will move her up to around 280. 

Jessica Pegula lost her rain-delayed semifinal match today at the WTA Credit One Charleston Open, with Belinda Bencic coming back from 4-2 down in the second set tiebreaker, when the match was suspended last night, to take it 7-5, after winning the first set 7-5. Ons Jabeur beat Bencic in a reversal of the outcome of the final last year in Charleston, taking the title by a 7-6(6), 6-4 score.

Unseeded Desirae Krawczyk(Arizona State) and Danielle Collins(Virginia) won the doubles title in Charleston, winning all four of their matches via match tiebreakers. They defeated No. 2 seed Kristina Mladenovic and Shuai Zhang in the second round and in today's final, took out top seeds Giuliana Olmos(USC) and Ena Shibahara(UCLA) 0-6, 6-4, 14-12, saving two match points. It's the eighth WTA doubles title for Krawczyk, the first for Collins.

Frances Tiafoe, who was the top seed at an ATP tournament for the first time this week at the 250 in rain-soaked Houston, won his second ATP title with two victories Sunday. In the semifinals, the 25-year-old defeated Gijs Brouwer of the Netherlands 6-4, 6-1; in tonight's final, Tiafoe got past 23-year-old Tomas Etcheverry of Argentina, the No. 8 seed, 7-6(1), 7-6(6). Tiafoe is now up to 11 in the ATP live rankings, a career high.