©Colette Lewis 2024--
San Diego California--
Iva Jovic and Jack Kennedy had divergent experiences at the ITF J300 in San Diego last year, with Jovic reaching the final and Kennedy falling in the first round. But both emerged as champions in the 2024 edition of the tournament, now a North American closed event, with No. 1 seed Jovic defeating No. 11 seed Kristina Penickova 6-3, 6-2 and No. 8 seed Kennedy edging No. 7 seed Ian Mayew 7-5, 7-5 on a cool and cloudy day at the Barnes Tennis Center.
Jovic took an early lead in both sets, with her break of Penickova in a lengthy third game of the first set proving pivotal.
"That game definitely shifted the momentum to my side," said the 16-year-old from Torrance California. "I took my chances, got a couple of good return winners off second serves, was brave in those moments. I knew she could play a lot of good tennis, she hits the ball super clean and is very aggressive, so I just had to kind of ride the wave and wait for it to drop down a little bit."
Jovic, who has been concentrating on improving her serve and her transition game, was especially pleased with her ability to hold serve, dropping only one service game in the match.
"I think I had the right strategy and played well in the big points," said Jovic, who lost only six games in her four previous matches. "I did a good job, for the most part, with my serve. That's the most concerning stat for me, the breaks, so I took care of my service games, and you only have to break once to win the set."
Jovic went up 3-0 in the second set before suffering that sole service break serving at 3-1. Penickova couldn't capitalize however, with Jovic breaking right back to maintain her lead and finishing with another break. Jovic's consistent depth and pace put pressure on Penickova on nearly every point, and she maintained that level throughout the match.
"She played so good today," said Penickova, who was playing in her second ITF J300 final. "I think I played pretty well, gave her at least a challenge."
Penickova acknowledged that dropping that third game of the first set was a blow to her chances of winning.
"I that was a big deciding game for the first set," said the 14-year-old from California, who now trains at the USTA Campus in Lake Nona. "Maybe if I had won that one game, maybe it would have been a little bit different."
Penickova said playing an opponent of Jovic's quality was important in assessing her own development.
"I definitely learned a lot," Penickova said. "I played her in practice matches before, so I had a little bit of an idea going in, but playing her and others like her have helped me with the aggressive part of my game."
Jovic, who was out for five months with an injury last year, was happy to win her third career ITF J300 tournament title by improving on her showing here last year.
"It's definitely a sigh of relief now," said the Jovic, who missed Roland Garros and Wimbledon last year while injured, but has solidified her place in the main draw of both junior slams with this title. "I got through this stretch where I had a lot to defend. And this is my first title of the year, so it feels good. I've been in two finals (a W35 in Texas and the J300 in Traralgon) and lost both, so it's nice to win a title for sure."
Kennedy has also earned his spot in this summer's junior slams, with the 15-year-old from New York winning a tight battle on Stadium court to cap an impressive two months on the ITF Junior Circuit, and an impressive two weeks in Southern California, as a finalist at Indian Wells and now a champion in San Diego.
Mayew had also had a breakout start to 2024, winning back-to-back J300 titles in Costa Rica and Colombia and reaching the singles quarterfinals and claiming the doubles title last week at Indian Wells.
The 17-year-old from North Carolina looked as if he was going to deny Kennedy his first J300 title when he took a 5-2 lead in the first set, but Kennedy roared back to claim the final five games of the hour-long set.
Mayew had two set points serving at 5-4, but he made a backhand error on the first, and didn't execute his plan on the second.
After using the drop shot effectively against the extremely quick Kennedy to build his lead, Mayew went to it again on his second set point. It was a good drop shot, and Kennedy could do no more than get it back over the net, but Mayew's backhand passing shot missed and Kennedy won the next two points to get back to 5-all.
"His drop shot, I told him after the match, it's really something, it might be better than Alcaraz's," Kennedy said. "His backhand drop shot was world class and it was effective; it won't work all the time but he executed it very well."
Mayew acknowledged that his dropshot was working well, but said that Kennedy was also having success against him with that shot.
"He started using it as well," said Mayew. "We both play pretty aggressive games, so we like to push each other side to side, so to throw in a drop shot is a nice mixup."
Mayew went up 4-2 in the second set, but Kennedy broke back in the next game and after three holds, Mayew was in trouble again serving at 5-all. Kennedy hit a winner off a good, not great drop shot attempt and then the errors began to multiply for Mayew. At 15-40, he made an unforced forehand error to give Kennedy the opportunity to serve out the match.
Kennedy looked shaky on the first two points, with a poor drop shot and a missed volley putting him in a hole. When Mayew made a difficult forehand overhead for 15-40, the match looked headed for a tiebreaker, but Mayew missed a routine backhand to squander the first break point. On the second Kennedy hit a ball deep in the corner that Mayew thought was out, but the chair umpire did not agree and Kennedy was back to deuce. He then came up with a second serve ace to get to match point, and converted it with a forehand winner.
Kennedy anticipated that Mayew would not be looking for a serve out wide in that situation.
"During the match, he was running around his backhand to hit the forehand, so I said, ok, I think he's going to do it here," Kennedy said. "I just trusted my game, went for it and hoped for the best. But me and my coach have been working on that quite a bit and it really pays off, in the biggest moments."
Mayew was impressed with Kennedy's game, despite his relatively young age.
"You saw some of the points out there," said Mayew, who has verbally committed to North Carolina for 2025. "His level right now was just too good for me today, but I think I brought a high level myself and I challenged him well. It could have gone either way, one or two points and that was the match. It wasn't like I should have done anything crazy different."
Mayew said he was unsure of his schedule in the next few months, but it will definitely include his first junior slams this summer in Paris and London.
"It's a first time for me, so I'll try to figure it out," said Mayew, who may play some of the tournaments leading up to Roland Garros this spring. "I never played on red clay before, but I did pretty well on green clay, got to semifinals of Clays last year. I'm looking forward to it, it's a junior slam, my first time, so I'm just going to enjoy the experience."
Kennedy played two J60s on the red clay in Spain last spring, winning one and reaching the final of the other, so he is eager to get back on the surface.
"I haven't played that much on the red clay, but I do enjoying playing on the clay," said Kennedy. "I can slide well, it's a little slower of a court and I prefer that. All in all, I think I prefer clay to hard courts."
Kennedy has a Florida family vacation coming up and then will represent the United States in the Junior Davis Cup North and Central American qualifying in the middle of April.
At the
$25,000 men's USTA Pro Circuit tournament in Calabasas California, 18-year-old Nishesh Basavareddy and 17-year-old wild card Trevor Svajda will play for the title Sunday after posting wins today. Stanford sophomore Basavareddy, the No. 8 seed, defeated Charlie Broom(Dartmouth/Baylor) 6-0, 5-7, 6-3, while SMU freshan Svajda advanced when Samir Banerjee(Stanford) retired after losing the first set 7-6(3).
The
Easter Bowl began today for the 12s and 14s, with the 16s and 18s beginning Monday. The draws are now up for the older age divisions at the
USTA tournament site.
The recap of today's action from Steve Pratt is below:
INDIAN WELLS, Calif. (March 23, 2024) – The two top-seeded players in the 14s singles division opened up play at the 56th FILA Easter Bowl taking different routes to the second round on Saturday at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden.
Girls’ 14s No. 1 Reiley Rhodes of Annapolis. Md, started fast with a 6-1, 6-4 win over Ksia Chen of Lafayette, Colo. The Boys’ 14s No. 1 barley survived his first-round match as Safir Azam from Redmond, Wash., had to come back after dropping the first set to beat Jose Vasquez of Boca Raton, Fla., 4-6, 6-2, 7-5.
Rhodes will next face Saanchi Dalal of Cary, N.C., in the second round. Azam will play Raj Pisal of Pleasanton, Calif., on Sunday.
The 14-year-old Rhodes was forced to retire mid-match in tine finals of the 14s National Indoors last November due to a groin injury, The finals appearance was Rhodes’ first USTA National Silver Ball in singles and she also has one in doubles.
Rhodes is playing her third FILA Easter Bowl and called it her favorite tournament. “It’s amazing to be here,” said Rhodes, before her doubles match at Palm Valley Country Club where she is playing with Bella Arwood of Georgia and the pair come in as the No. 5 seeded team. “Last year was my first year in the 14s and I lost in the first round and two years ago I made it to the Round of 16s in the 12s. It’s great to be the No. 1 seeded this year.”
Rhodes is traveling this week with her father Keith Rhodes and trains at the Junior Tennis Champions Center in College Park, Md., and coached by Ali Agnamba.
Also moving on in the 14s was No. 2 seeded Andrew Johnson, who trains with Peter Smith at the famed Kramer Club in Rolling Hills. Johnson is playing with all the confidence in the world coming off singles and doubles titles at the 14s Winternationals in January after winning the Junior Orange Bowl a month before.
The top seeds in the boys’ and girls’ 12s – Smyan Thuta from San Jose, Calif., and Nikol Davletshina from Boca Raton, Fla. – both won easily with Thuta downing Jacques Chen from Jericho, N.Y., and Davletshina dropping just one game against Gabriela Hernandez of Virginia.
FILA Easter Bowl matches will once again be live-streamed on www.EasterBowl.com with Fox Sports Radio and Tennis Channel commentator Bryan Fenley handling the play-by-play duties.
0 comments:
Post a Comment