Amey Ousts No. 3 Seed in Second Round B14s Easter Bowl Action, 18s and 16s Begin Play Monday; SMU's Svajda Claims First Pro Circuit Title; Texas Men Shut Out No. 2 TCU

©Colette Lewis 2024--
Indian Wells California--

Sunday was another unseasonably cool and windy day in the desert, with the 12s and 14s divisions playing their second round matches at the FILA Easter Bowl.

Safir Azam and Reiley Rhodes, the top seeds in the 14s, and Smyan Thuta and Nikol Davletshina, the top seeds in the 12s, are through to the round of 16 with straight set victories, but two No. 3 seeds fell today, with Isabelle Nguyen beating London Evans 6-4, 6-4 in the girls 12s and Colter Amey sending Tristan Stratton to the back draw with a 4-6, 6-4, 7-5 win in a three-hour marathon.

Amey was down 6-4, 4-2, 30-0, but won the last four games of the second set, which helped him mentally as he approached the third.

"I felt a lot looser after I won the second set," said the 14-year-old from Florida. "It was putting every ball in the court; I refused to lose down 4-2 30-0, I said, there's no way I'm loosing, so I just kept on fighting."

Both players struggled with the windy conditions, with Stratton going up a break at 2-1 and 3-2, but getting broken immediately. After those four breaks, Amey managed to hold after a long game, and broke Stratton at love in the next game to take a 5-3 lead. 

Serving for the match, Amey got to match point at 40-30, but a Stratton forehand forced an error to save it. At deuce, Stratton got to a tricky reply from a net cord exchange, and hit an improbable backhand winner down the line, and when Amey missed a forehand approach long, Stratton was back on serve.

"I worried a little bit, but not much," Amey said of his inability to convert his match point. "I'm going to lose if I worry about it. But if I reset, I'm probably going to win, so I just completely forgot about it and kept on playing."

Given that he had lost his last three service games, Stratton was not guaranteed to pull even, but he held at love for 5-5, and Amey followed with a love hold of his own for 6-5.

Stratton started the final game with a forehand winner, but he made three straight errors to give Amey two match points. He took the first, hitting a forehand approach and coming into the net, with Stratton attempt at a backhand pass finding the net.

"He got everything back, so I really needed to step my game up, come forward and close it out, instead of letting him get every ball back," Amey said. 

Amey had just an hour to prepare for his doubles match, but he wasn't fazed by the schedule.

"Honestly, I'm used to playing four matches a day, so two's fine for me."

The 16s and 18s division begin Monday morning, with the top eight seeds lists below. The popcorn match is in the B18s, with Ian Bracks playing top seed Braeden Gelletich, in a rematch of the Easter Bowl 16s final last year, won by Bracks 7-6(4), 6-4.

Another dangerous unseeded player in the 18s is Olivia Center, currently 103 in the ITF Junior rankings. Defending champion Cassius Chinlund is one of the eight No. 9 seeds.

Steve Pratt, who is covering the tournament for the Easter Bowl website, spoke with Bracks about facing Gelletich again in this article:

INDIAN WELLS, Calif. (March 24, 2024) – A first-round rematch between last year’s Boys’ 16s singles finalists highlights a full day of play as all eight divisions are in action at the 56^th Annual FILA Easter Bowl on Monday at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden. 

 

In last year’s 16s final, Oklahoma State-bound Ian Bracks from Tulsa, Okla., took out Braeden Gelletich from Goshen, N.Y., 7-6 (4), 6-4, for the coveted USTA National Gold ball.

 

Facing Gelletich on Day 1 of the Boys’ 18s could be viewed as an unfortunate draw for the unseeded Bracks going against the No. 1 seed, but Bracks said Sunday it doesn’t really matter who he opens up with. 

 

“It was such a cool experience last year playing in the final,” said Bracks, a 17-year-old high school senior who trains at the Tucker Tennis Academy.

 

Bracks holds a 4-0 career head-to-head against Gelletich also winning at past Clay Court and Indoor Nationals and the USTA Spring Team Championships.

 

“It’s always a close match when we play and it’s just a few points here or there that decides it,” Bracks said. “It’s pretty exciting. It will be a good match.”

 

Bracks is playing doubles with Nicholas Patrick from Coal Valley, Ill., and is hoping to leave the Coachella Valley with a national ball in both singles and doubles, just like he did at the FILA Easter Bowl in 2021 when he got a bronze in singles and a silver in doubles in the 14s. 

Easter Bowl G16s Top 8 Seeds:
1. Bella Payne
2. Alyson Shannon
3. Nancy Lee
4. Sobee Oak
5. Isabelle DeLuccia
6. Carrie-Anne Hoo
7. Kaya Moe
8. Alexandra Wolf

G18s Top 8 Seeds:
1. Capucine Jauffret
2. Addison Lanton
3. Sophia Holod
4. Anita Tu
5. Claire Hill
6. Avery Nguyen
7. Emily Deming
8. Alana Boyce

B16s Top 8 Seeds:
1. Gus Grumet
2. Gavin Goode
3. Lukas Phimvongsa
4. Yannik Alvarez
5. Shaan Patel
6. Ethan Chung
7. James Quattro
8. Ryan Cozad

B18s Top 8 Seeds:
1. Braeden Gelletich
2. William Manning
3. Shaurya Bharadwaj
4. Declan Galligan
5. Dylan Long
6. Mitchell Sheldon
7. Aidan Atwood
8. Saahith Jayaraman
9. Cassius Chinlund

Two of the boys 16s seeds, who are friends and frequent doubles partners, are coming to the desert from last week's ITF J60 in Puerto Rico, where Yannick Alvarez, the top seed, defeated Ryan Cozad, the No. 2 seed, 6-4, 6-2 in the singles final, while also claiming the doubles championship.

Jon Gamble won his second straight title J60 title in Central America, adding a title last week in Panama to the one he won two weeks ago in El Salvador.

University of Virginia signee Stiles Brockett, who opted for European clay rather than the two Southern California hard courts events the past two weeks, reached the semifinals at the J300 in Croatia two weeks ago, and the final of the J300 in Spain this past week.

SMU head coach Grant Chen and Trevor Svajda
photo credit: Jon Mulvey

Seventeen-year-old wild card Trevor Svajda, a freshman at SMU, won his first USTA Pro Circuit title today at the $25,000 tournament in Calabasas California. Svajda defeated No. 8 seed Nishesh Basavareddy 6-4, 6-1 in the final, his second win over Basavareddy in the past seven months. Svajda, the No. 10 seed, defeated No. 2 seed Basavareddy 7-6(3), 6-1 in the semifinals of the Kalamazoo 18s last August.

The college tennis conference season is in full swing, with the Texas and TCU men meeting for a second time, this time in a Big 12 conference match in Austin. It was all Longhorns, with No. 8 Texas beating No. 2 TCU 5-0. Jake Fearnley, the hero of TCU's 4-3 win over Texas early this month in Fort Worth, had been out with an injury and is now playing No. 2, with Sebastian Gorzny also out for TCU in today's match. Siem Woldeab did play for Texas in this match after missing the earlier one.