Wild Card Ionescu, Indian Wells Finalist Kennedy Advance to San Diego J300 Semifinals; Doubles Finals Set For Friday; SMU's Svajda, Stanford Trio Advance to Calabasas $25K Quarterfinals

©Colette Lewis 2024--
San Diego California--

After four days of competition at the ITF J300 North American Closed in San Diego, only players from the United States remain in contention for the title, with the semifinals set for Saturday morning at the Barnes Tennis Center.

Top seed Iva Jovic, playing on Stadium Court for the first time this week, again had no difficulty advancing, beating No. 12 seed Capucine Jauffret 6-1, 6-1. The 16-year-old from Torrance California, who reached the final here last year, has lost six games in her three matches.

She will face the only unseeded player remaining in either draw, 15-year-old wild card Elizabeth Ionescu, who came from 4-2 down in the final set to beat No. 9 seed Monika Ekstrand 5-7, 6-4 6-4.

Ionescu was serving up 2-1 in the third set, but was broken, and Ekstrand appeared to take control of the match with a hold and another break, with Ionescu failing to converting three game points. Ionescu, berating herself in Romanian, the language of her parents, was obviously frustrated, but Ekstrand couldn't take advantage, playing a poor service game at 4-2 to let Ionescu back in. With her first serve unreliable and her powerful groundstrokes missing both long and in the net, Ekstrand won only one point in that 4-2 service game, and went on to lose 11 straight points, with Ionescu holding at love and then going up 0-40 with Ekstrand serving at 4-all. Ionescu got the break at 15 to serve for the match, and although she fell behind 15-30, Ekstrand continued struggling with her forehand, netting a forehand to give Ionescu a match point, then hitting another long to end the three-hour and 15 minute battle of groundstrokes.

Ionescu was not surprised by the reversal of her fortunes at the end of the match.

"I do that a lot actually, go down and just come back," said Ionescu, who is from York Pennsylvania. "I think it's just the mentality of ok, I can't afford to miss this next shot. When you're down 2-4, you don't have time to make those mistakes and it's all about not taking any points for granted."

Ionescu said she is still learning how to mentally handle a long, tough match like today's.

"I got a little bit too emotional and tight during the match," Ionescu said. "Hot and cold, on and off, so staying more composed and content with myself is what I'm going to work on in the future."

The other girls semifinal will feature No. 4 seed Aspen Schuman and No. 11 seed Kristina Penickova. Schuman needed just over two hours to take out Nadia Lagaev, the last Canadian player in the draw, grinding out a 7-5, 6-2 win over the unseeded left-hander.  The 14-year-old Penickova defeated twin sister Annika 6-3, 7-5, coming from 5-3 down in the second set to even their head-to-head record on the ITF Junior Circuit at 2 apiece.

Schuman and Penickova are the only semifinal featuring a rematch, with Schuman defeating Penickova 6-4, 6-1 last September at the Pan American Closed in Houston.

A finalist at the J300 in Indian Wells last week, No. 8 seed Jack Kennedy has continued the form he has displayed all year, digging in to defeat unseeded Mitchell Lee 3-6, 6-2, 6-3 in another three-hour quarterfinal.

Kennedy, who is 21-3 this year on the ITF Junior Circuit, didn't panic when Lee came out blasting winners.

"The guy was playing unreal," said the 15-year-old from New York. "I wasn't really familiar with his game, so I was kind of figuring that out in the first set, but as the match went on, I was settling in with the nerves and the conditions, so when I went back to basics, keeping it simple, I overcame the tougher moments."

Kennedy was down a break at 1-2, but won the last five games of the match.

"I was a little agitated, but I went back to what I've been working on, keeping mental toughness," Kennedy said. "I broke back and I think after that he was a little ticked off by that and I could sense he was a little tired, so I took advantage when I saw that."

Kennedy said all the matches he's won over the past couple of months gave him confidence, even when he encountered an opponent who was outplaying him.

"It wasn't me playing bad, it was him having an answer for everything I was giving him," Kennedy said. "So when he had answer, it sends a message to me, oh, you're playing bad. But then you realize, oh, ok, make him play, see what he can bring and make sure he can do it for two, maybe three, hours."

Kennedy's opponent will be No. 10 seed Nikita Filin, who eliminated unseeded Keaton Hance, who had taken out top seed Cooper Woestendick in the second round, 7-6(3), 6-4. 

Filin's win in a third-set tiebreaker over doubles partner and No. 6 seed Jagger Leach in Wednesday's third round gave Filin the confidence he needed to face another one the next morning.

"I knew he was playing well and that he was a really good player, and I wasn't taking him lightly at all," said Filin, who will be playing in his second ITF J300 semifinal Friday. "I had to save a lot of break points in the first set, just to stay in the set, and I played a good tiebreak. I was pretty confident after yesterday; I'm starting to figure out where I can lock down on points and where I can go for more shots."

Filin, a 17-year-old left-hander from Chicago, said reaching the doubles final in Indian Wells last week also gave him confidence, although he prefers the conditions, and the Wilson balls, in San Diego.

"I can dictate with my forehand here, the ball jumps up in these courts and goes through it more, especially with the US Open balls," said Filin, who lost his first singles match at Indian Wells. "I didn't play bad last week at all, I just couldn't get any free points, but I knew I was playing well and that I could go deep in this tournament, with these conditions definitely suiting me better."

No. 7 seed Ian Mayew avoided the fate of the previous two seeds against unseeded Dominick Mosejczuk, beating him 6-3, 6-1. Mosejczuk had beaten No. 2 seed Alex Razeghi and No. 13 seed Maximus Dussault the previous two rounds.

Mayew will face 2023 finalist Roy Horovitz, who overcame a rough start to defeat No. 5 seed Matthew Forbes 1-6, 6-1, 7-6(4). Horovitz, the No. 3 seed, made every important passing shot in the deciding tiebreaker; after losing only two games in his first two matches, he got the test he was expecting from Forbes.

Horovitz will also play in the doubles final Friday, after he and Razeghi, the No. 1 seeds, defeated No. 3 seeds Filin and Leach 7-5, 6-3 in this afternoon's semifinals. Their opponents will be No. 2 seeds and Australian Open boys doubles champions Woestendick and Max Exsted, who defeated No. 4 seeds Forbes and Kase Schinnerer 6-4, 7-6(9), finally converting their fifth match point.

With no singles players in the girls doubles semifinals, they were played earlier in the day, with USTA National 18s champions Olivia Center and Kate Fakih, the No. 3 seeds, defeating top seeds Shannon Lam and Thea Frodin 6-2, 6-2. No. 7 seeds Kayla Chung and Alanis Hamilton defeated the unseeded team of Anita Tu and Tianmei Wang 6-1, 6-3.

Three members of the Stanford Cardinal are through to the quarterfinals of this week's USTA Pro Circuit men's $25,000 event two hours up the road in Calabasas: Nishesh Basavareddy, Samir Banerjee and Kyle Kang. Kang defeated No. 2 seed Ethan Quinn(Georgia) 7-5, 6-3; No. 8 seed Basavareddy defeated qualifier Vito Tonejc of Croatia 6-1, 6-4 and Banerjee took out Nathan Ponwith(Georgia/Arizona State) 6-4, 6-4. SMU freshman and 2023 Kalamazoo 18s finalist Trevor Svajda also reached the quarterfinals, beating No. 6 seed Omni Kumar(Duke) 6-3, 6-3.

Svajda will play unseeded Karue Sell(UCLA), who took out top seed August Holmgren(San Diego) of Denmark 6-4, 6-3 today. Sell had defeated Indian Wells J300 semifinalist Kaylan Bigun in the first round 5-7, 7-6(4), 6-1.

Basavareddy plays No. 3 seed Brandon Holt(USC), who won last week's $25K in Bakersfield, beating unseeded Timo Legout of France 6-4, 6-4 in the final.