Teams for ITF World Junior Tennis 14U Team Championships Announced; Pareja Extends Winning Streak to 15 with ITF J200 Title in Colombia; Hoo, Ahmad, Budacsek Claim ITF Junior Circuit Titles; Tien's Streak Reaches 26 at Chicago Challenger

The teams for the ITF World Junior Tennis 14-and-under Team Championships were announced today, with the United States teams competing in Prostejov in the Czech Republic next month featuring all five of the Americans who played the Wimbledon 14-and-under tournament two weeks ago.

The US boys team consists of Michael Antonius, Jordan Lee and, the one participant who did not play the Wimbledon event, Teodor Davidov. USTA National Coach Sylvain Guichard is the captain. 

The US girls team is Welles Newman, Maggie Sohns and Raya Kotseva, who recently switched her country representation from Bulgaria to the United States. At Wimbledon, I confirmed with Kotseva, who has lived for years in Las Vegas, that she had recently received her green card. USTA National Coach Thierry Champion is the captain.

There are seven countries that have teams for both boys and girls: Argentina, Czech Republic(hosts), Japan, Korea, Great Britain, Morocco and USA, with 25 countries having at least one team. All four of the boys in the Wimbledon 14U semifinals are competing in Prostejov: champion Takahiro Kawaguchi of Japan, finalist Lee, Donjae Kim of Korea and Stan Put of the Netherlands. Two of the girls semifinalists, champion Jana Kovackova of the Czech Republic and Great Britain's Megan Knight are representing their countries, as are several other boys and girls who did not win their round robin groups.

Fifteen-year-old Julieta Pareja won her first ITF Junior Circuit singles title two weeks ago at a J100 in Medellin Colombia and followed that up last week with the title at the J200 in Bogota, both on clay. With her ITF women's W15 title in Rancho Santa Fe in June, Pareja now has a 15-match winning streak, and she has not lost a set in either of her two ITF Junior Circuit championship runs. In Bogota, the ninth-seeded Pareja beat No. 2 seed Christasha McNeil in the final 6-1, 6-1. She is now at 106 in the ITF junior rankings, up 44 spots from last week.

Calvin Baierl, the No. 3 seed, reached the boys singles final, falling to Luis Guto Miguel of Brazil 7-5, 7-5 in the championship match.

Fifteen-year-old Carrie-Ann Hoo won her third, and biggest, ITF Junior Circuit title of her career at the J100 in the Dominican Republic. Hoo, seeded No. 11, defeated No. 7 seed Isabella Marton of Canada 6-2, 7-5 in the final, while also making the doubles final with Brooke Wallman. All three of Hoo's ITF Junior Circuit singles titles have come in 2024.

At the J30 in El Salvador, 14-year-old Izyan (Zizou) Ahmad won his second consecutive singles title, and his third this year. Seeded No. 3, Ahmad defeated the top seed in the semifinals and then unseeded Jeronimo Duque Salazar of Colombia 6-0, 6-1 in the final. Fifteen-year-old Sophia Budacsek swept the girls titles, with the No. 2 seed winning her first singles title with a 5-7, 6-3, 7-5 victory over top seed Carlota Balseiro of Argentina. Budacsek and Balseiro were on the same side of the net for the doubles final, with the top seeds defeating No. 2 seeds Viktoria Monge of Ecuador and Alison Ramirez of Guatemala 6-2, 6-4 for the title. 

The sixth ITF Junior Circuit title of the week came at the J30 in Jamaica, with 16-year-old Taylor Yarnell winning his second doubles title with Jerry Han of Canada. The top seeds defeated unseeded Mac Goldemberg and Hong Kong's Terry Lau 7-5, 6-1 in the final. 

The final round of qualifying and six first round singles matches were played today at the ATP Challenger 75 in Chicago, with attention again focused on 18-year-old wild card Learner Tien and his winning streak. Tien won his 26th consecutive match this evening, beating No. 2 seed Benjamin Bonzi of France 6-4, 6-4. Tien, who didn't face a break point, broke Bonzi serving at 4-5 in each set. At 133 in the ATP rankings, Bonzi represents the best win of Tien's career. He now faces the winner of Tuesday's match between Juan Pablo Ficovich of Argentina and qualifier Aidan Mayo. 

The others who qualified today are: Great Britain's Jake Fearnley(TCU), who missed today's White House visit by the NCAA champion TCU team; Estonia's Mark Lajal; Michael Zheng(Columbia); Tung-Lin Wu of Taiwan and Japan's James Trotter(Ohio State).

Wild cards were given to Tien, Nishesh Basavareddy(Stanford) and Andrew Fenty(Michigan).

An ATP feature on Tien and his winning streak was published Friday.