My Wimbledon 14U Recap; Tien Rolls on at Chicago Challenger; All-USA Semifinals in Dallas and Champaign; House Settlement Tennis Roster Limits Set; 2025 NCAA Individual Championships Slated for USTA National Campus

My Tennis Recruiting Network article on this month's 14-and-under tournament at Wimbledon is up today, featuring Americans Jordan Lee and Raya Kotseva, who discussed their experience playing on grass and being a part of the tennis festival that is Wimbledon. I also was able to provide some coverage of the championship matches, with Jana Kovackova of the Czech Republic adding to her already impressive resume, and Takahiro Kawaguchi of Japan putting himself at the forefront of the best 14-year-olds in the world.

The USTA 16s and 18s National Championships begin a week from today in Kalamazoo, with the participation of two-time defending champion Learner Tien(USC) increasingly in doubt.  The 18-year-old wild card from Irvine California won his 28th consecutive match today at the ATP Challenger 75 in Chicago, beating No. 8 seed Seongchan Hong of Korea 6-3, 6-1 to advance to the semifinals. Tien, who is on an eight-match Challenger winning streak after claiming the Bloomfield Hills Challenger at the start of this month, will take on No. 6 seed Yunchaokete Bu of China for a place in the Chicago final. Tien and Bu played in the second round in Bloomfield Hills, with Tien mounting an impressive comeback in his 0-6, 7-5, 6-0 win.  

Tien, now 240 in the ATP live rankings, is the last American still in contention, so he will increase his lead in the USTA Wild Card Challenge. That makes the Kalamazoo US Open wild card less urgent, and his ATP ranking would be the best of any player to compete in Kalamazoo this century. Frances Tiafoe, who won the Kalamazoo 18s title in 2015, was came in at 284 that year.

With Cincinnati Open ATP Masters 1000 qualifying beginning Sunday August 11, the day of the Kalamazoo final, Tien would have to forego one of the four qualifying wild cards he might be offered if he played Kalamazoo. The lure of winning an unprecedented third 18s singles title may not be enough with so many possibilities opening up due to this streak.

The other semifinal at the Chicago Challenger features two former college stars: Great Britain's Jake Fearnley, a recent TCU graduate, and Canada's Gabe Diallo, who left Kentucky in 2022 after his junior year.  Qualifier Fearnley defeated Brandon Holt(USC) 6-3, 6-2 and Diallo, seeded No. 4, beat Mitchell Krueger by the same score.

Tien isn't the only USTA National 18s champion to reach a semifinal this week, with Clervie Ngounoue, the 2023 San Diego champion, reaching the final four at the USTA Pro Circuit W50 in Dallas. Ngounoue, a qualifier, defeated No. 4 seed Manachaya Sawangkaew (Oklahoma State) of Thailand 6-2, 7-5 and will face top seed Kayla Day in the semifinals Saturday. Day beat last week's Evansville W75 champion Sophie Chang 6-2, 5-7, 6-3 in the quarterfinals today. Ngounoue, who received a main draw wild card into the WTA 500 in Washington DC next week, has drawn 2022 NCAA singles champion Peyton Stearns(Texas) in the first round.

Texas A&M rising senior Mary Stoiana, who reached the Evansville final, defeated Catherine Harrison(UCLA) 7-6(4), 4-6, 6-2 to set up a semifinal with another former Bruin, Robin Anderson. Anderson beat Elvina Kalieva 3-6, 6-1, 6-1.

As with the women in Dallas, all the semifinalists at the USTA Pro Circuit men's $25,000 tournament in Champaign are from the United States.

Arizona rising senior Colton Smith defeated top seed Aidan McHugh of Great Britain 6-3, 2-6, 6-2 to advance to the semifinals in Illinois. Smith, a wild card, will play No. 3 seed Cannon Kingsley(Ohio State), who beat Noah Schachter(Texas A&M) 6-3, 6-4. In the bottom half, No. 4 seed Andre Ilagan(Hawaii) will face No. 6 seed Harrison Adams(Texas A&M). Ilagan advanced when qualifier Gavin Young(Michigan) retired trailing 6-4, 3-1; Adams defeated University of Illinois rising junior Kenta Miyoshi of Japan 6-2, 3-6, 6-2.

The qualifying for the ATP and WTA 500s in Washington DC begins Saturday, with all four of the men's qualifying wild cards going to former collegians: Eliot Spizzirri(Texas), Tristan Boyer(Stanford), Thai Kwiatkowski(Virginia) and Andrew Fenty(Michigan).

Two important pieces of news from college tennis today, with the House settlement roster limits for all sports announced today. (This is for the Power 4 conferences, other schools have the option of opting out if they decide not to share revenue with student-athletes according to this Yahoo sports article). Beginning with the 2025 academic year, roster spots are capped at 10 for both men and women. According to this article from cbssports.com, all scholarships can now be divided, which has been the case for men's tennis, who have 4.5 scholarships, but not for women, who currently have eight full scholarships.

"Schools will also have flexibility in sharing scholarships, with all sports now labeled as "equivalency sports," allowing for partial scholarships to be distributed to players in football and basketball. Those sports were previously tabbed as "head-count sports," which required players to be on full scholarship."

As a non-revenue sport, tennis is not at the forefront of the explanations, so it will take more time to understand what the impact these roster limits will have on the sport as schools begin to make their decisions on funding.

The 2025 NCAA singles and doubles championships will be held at the USTA National Campus in Lake Nona, according to this tweet from John Parsons. Baylor was announced as the 2024 host some time ago, and they are hosting the 2025 NCAA team championships in May, but the 2025 individual championships in the fall, in their second year of a pilot program, did not have a site until this announcement. It was rumored that Georgia, which will have the 2026 NCAA team championships, was not interested in hosting the individuals and that seems to have been the case.