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Saturday, May 6, 2023

UCLA Women Shock Duke to Reach Super Regional; Stanford Men, Auburn Women Eliminate Hosts to Advance; Baierl, Rolls Claim ITF J100 Titles in Coral Gables; Day and Li Meet for Bonita Springs $100K Title Sunday

The long second day of regional action in NCAA Division I ended with a huge upset Saturday night, as the UCLA women defeated No. 6 seed Duke 4-3 in Durham. The Bruins are the first team to prevent a Top Eight seed from hosting a Super Regional, with all men's and women's teams seeded 1-8 advancing to host the Super Regionals both in 2019 and last year.


UCLA served for the doubles point but ended up losing it in a tiebreaker, and they looked unlikely to recover when they fell behind 3-1, with Duke's Chloe Beck and Emma Jackson getting singles wins at lines 1 and 3 after UCLA's Elise Wagle had gotten the Bruins on the board. Duke, playing without Cameron Morra, their usual No. 2, couldn't hold off UCLA's comeback, with Kimmi Hance making it 3-2 with a win at line 2 and freshman Christine Lutkemeyer coming back from 6-0, 3-0 down to earn a 0-6, 7-5, 6-3 win at line 6. It came down to line 5, where Sasha Vagramov of UCLA and Juliia Bryzgalova were still in late in the second set after three and a half hours of competition. Bryzgalova saved one match point in the second set tiebreaker, but Vagramov got the second in her 7-6(3), 7-6(6) victory.

UCLA will now travel to Iowa State for next weekend's Super Regionals. The two team met in the kickoff weekend in January at the University of Miami, with Iowa State earning a 4-3 victory to jump start their historic season.

The other women's Top 16 team who did not advance was Miami. Unseeded Auburn, currently No. 18 in the ITA rankings they defeated No. 14 seed Miami 4-3 in Coral Gables. 

One of the eight men's regional finals played today went to the visitor, with No. 21 Stanford, plagued by injuries all season, defeating No. 13 seed Columbia 4-2 at the USTA Billie Jean King Tennis Center in New York. The top four at Stanford--Arthur Fery, Samir Banerjee, Nishesh Basavareddy and Max Basing--have rarely all been in the lineup together, but they were today, and the top three got wins, with freshman Banerjee, who had committed to Columbia before switching to Stanford, getting the clinching win. The match at line 6 was protested, so it is shown as unfinished in the box score, but because Stanford won without it, the protest is moot.

The most exciting match of the day given the seeding, was No. 4 Kentucky's 4-3 victory over Northwestern in Lexington. The Wildcats took the doubles point, but Northwestern took all six first sets in singles and eventually built a 3-1 lead. But as they did against Georgia, who also had a 3-1 lead in the SEC championship match, 2022 NCAA finalist Kentucky rebounded, with Taha Baadi getting the clinching victory at line 4.

Updated draws for the men are here and the women are here.

Cracked Racquets will continue to provide coverage of the remaining eight men's regional finals Sunday at their YouTube Channel. College Tennis Ranks has links for scoring and individual live streams at the Week Ahead tab. 

Division I Regional Final results(first round results are available at Friday's post). Upsets in bold:

WOMEN, Saturday May 6:

Chapel Hill
FINAL:
No. 1 North Carolina[1] d Old Dominion[3] 4-0

Gainesville
FINAL:
No. 16 Florida[1] d Georgia Tech[2] 4-1

Malibu
FINAL: 
No. 9 Pepperdine[1] d Southern California[2] 4-1

Austin
FINAL:
No. 8 Texas[1] d San Diego[3] 4-0

Ann Arbor
FINAL: 
No. 5 Michigan[5] d Notre Dame[2] 4-1

Charlottesville
FINAL:
No. 12 Virginia[1] d Princeton[2] 4-0

Norman
FINAL:
No. 13 Oklahoma[1] d Washington[2] 4-1

======
Raleigh
FINAL: No. 3 NC State[1]] d Kansas[2] 4-0

Coral Gables
FINAL:
Auburn[2] d No. 14 Miami[1] 4-3

Ames
FINAL:
No. 11 Iowa St[1] d Wisconsin[2] 4-1

Durham
FINAL:
UCLA[2] d No. 6 Duke[1] 4-3

Stanford
FINAL: 
No. 7 Stanford[1] d Oklahoma State[2] 4-1

Columbus
FINAL: 
No. 10 Ohio State[1] d Vanderbilt[2] 4-2

Knoxville
FINAL:
No. 15 Tennessee[1] d Wake Forest[3] 4-1

College Station
FINAL:
No. 2 Texas A&M[1] d Baylor[3] 4-0
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++

MEN, Saturday May 6

Columbia
FINAL:
No. 9 South Carolina[1] d Florida State[2] 4-1

New York
FINAL:
Stanford[2] d Columbia[13] 4-2

Lexington
FINAL:
No. 4 Kentucky[1] d Northwestern[2] 4-3
======
Tucson
FINAL:
No. 14 Arizona[1] d Oklahoma St[3] 4-0

Cambridge
FINAL:
No. 11 Harvard[1] d Arizona St[3] 4-0

Los Angeles
FINAL:
No. 10 Southern California[1] d San Diego[2] 4-1

Starkville
FINAL:
No. 15 Mississippi St[1] d Middle Tennessee[2] 4-2

Fort Worth
FINAL:
No. 2 TCU[1] d Texas A&M[2] 4-0
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Men's first round results, Saturday May 6 (upsets in bold)

Austin
No. 1 Texas[1] d Texas A&M-CC[4] 4-0
Pepperdine[2] d UTSA[3] 4-1

Chapel Hill
Utah[2] d. Old Dominion[3] 4-1
No. 16 North Carolina[1] d Drake[4] 4-1

Knoxville
Wake Forest[2] d Memphis[3] 4-1
No. 8 Tennessee[1] d Belmont[4] 4-1 

Charlottesville
No. 5 Virginia[1] d Navy[4] 4-0
Ole Miss[2] d VCU[3] 4-0

Durham
Cornell[3] d Auburn[2] 4-3
No. 12 Duke[1] d UNCW[4] 4-2

======
Columbus
No. 3 Ohio State[1] d ETSU[4] 4-0
Louisville[3] d Texas Tech[2] 4-3

Athens
Oklahoma[3] d NC State[2] 4-2
No. 6 Georgia[1] d FGCU[4] 4-0

Ann Arbor
No. 7 Michigan[1] d Toledo[4] 4-0
Cal[2] d LSU[3] 4-1


The ITF J100 in Coral Gables Florida concluded today, with 16-year-old Katie Rolls and 15-year-old Calvin Baierl winning the singles titles.

The top-seeded Rolls defeated No. 13 seed Tianmei Wang 6-2, 6-4 in today's final, losing just one set in her six victories this week. It's the third ITF Junior Circuit singles title for Rolls.

2022 Kalamazoo 16s finalist Baierl also earned his third ITF Junior Circuit singles title today, with the No. 13 seed defeating No. 5 seed Bernardo Munk Mesa of Spain 4-6, 6-3, 6-2. Baierl also came from a set down in the third round and the semifinals this week.

No. 3 seeds Maren Urata and Sophia Webster took the doubles title, beating top seeds Ava Bruno and Riley Crowder 6-2, 6-2 in the final. It's the second ITF Junior Circuit title for Urata and the fifth for Webster, all with other partners.

The top seeds did win the boys doubles championship, with Miguel Tobon of Colombia and Cesar Cruz of El Salvador defeating the unseeded team of Tygen Goldammer and Dylan Jaen 4-6, 6-4, 10-8 in the final. 

Ann Li and Kayla Day will renew their rivalry in the final of the $100,000 USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Bonita Springs Florida Sunday. Li, 22, and Day, 23, met four times in ITF Junior Circuit events, with Li's only victory in the semifinals of the Wimbledon Junior CHampionships in 2017. Day is also up 2-0 on Li in Pro Circuit matches, with her most recent win coming in the second round of qualifying for last month's WTA 500 tournament in Charleston.

No. 7 seed Day defeated No. 3 seed Caroline Dolehide 7-6(5), 1-6, 6-0 in today's semifinals, while the unseeded Li beat unseeded Astra Sharma(Vanderbilt) of Australia 6-2, 6-3.

At the men's $15,000 USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Orange Park Florida, two former college stars will play for the singles title. No. 7 Matija Pecotic(Princeton) of Croatia defeated No. 3 seed Matias Descotte of Argentina 6-3, 6-2 to face former South Florida All-American Roberto Cid of the Dominican Republic. Cid defeated 2021 NCAA singles finalist Daniel Rodrigues(South Carolina) of Portugal 5-7, 6-1, 6-3.

In the doubles final, No. 2 seeds Vasil Kirkov and Roy Stepanov(Southeastern) defeated No. 3 seeds Elio Jose Ribeiro Lago of Italy and Ricardo Rodriguez of Venezuela 6-3, 7-5.

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