Virginia Men Hand No. 1 Wake Forest First Loss, TCU Loses to UCF; Georgia and Texas A&M Meet Again in SEC Women's Conference Final; Nava Reaches Tallahassee Challenger Final; Shelton Plays for Title at ATP 500 in Munich

With three of the four major conference tournaments this weekend, there was no shortage of intriguing Division I matches, and drama was everywhere in today's semifinals. 

The University of Virginia was the shining star at the ACC men's and women's championships in Cary North Carolina, with the men handing No. 1 Wake Forest its first loss of the season 4-3, while the Virginia women beat top seed Duke for the second time this year, earning a 4-2 victory earlier in the day.

Wake Forest started singles in its usual position, up 1-0 after grabbing the doubles point, but Virginia, the No. 5 seed despite their national ranking of No. 6, came out strong in singles, taking five first sets. Wake made it 2-0 with a win by freshman Charlie Robertson over James Hopper at line 4, but the Cavaliers were able to get the next three points, with straight-sets wins by their freshman: Jangjun Kim over Luca Pow at line 5, Keegan Rice over Ionnas Xilas at line 3 and Rafael Jodar over Stefan Dostanic at line 1. Wake Forest's DK Suresh had forced a third set against Dylan Dietrich at line 2, and Luciano Tacchi had also pushed Mans Dahlberg to a third at line 6, and when Suresh and Tacchi got out to 4-2 leads in their third sets, it looked as if the Demon Deacons might escape with another tight victory. Suresh closed out Dietrich to make it 3-3, but Dahlberg not only got his break back, but took four games in a row for a 6-2, 5-7, 6-4 victory that ended the 34-match Wake Forest winning streak.

Virginia will face Stanford, which had its own nail-biter, with the Cardinal, seeded No. 3, beating No. 7 seed Duke 4-2. Duke had beaten No. 2 seed NC State 4-3 in Friday's quarterfinals. 

The Virginia women, seeded No. 4, had struggled with injuries throughout the conference season, but had nearly everyone in the lineup for the ACC tournament, which got them past No. 5 seed Cal 4-0 in the quarterfinals and Duke 4-2 today. 

They will face No. 2 seed North Carolina in Sunday's final, after the Tar Heels beat No. 3 seeds North Carolina State 4-1.

Virginia and North Carolina met in the conference final last year, with UNC winning 4-1, but in their two meetings this year, Virginia has earned two 4-3 victories.

In the SEC, the top-seeded Texas men avenged their regular season loss last weekend to No. 5 seed Tennessee, taking a 4-2 victory after Timo Legout saved a match point in the second set against Alex Kotzen at line 1 and ended up clinching the match 5-7, 7-5, 6-3.

Texas will play host South Carolina, the No. 3 seed, who beat Mississippi State 4-3, courtesy of two third-set tiebreakers at lines 1 and 5. The Longhorns beat the Gamecocks 4-0 in Austin last month in conference play.

The women's SEC conference final is a familiar one, with Georgia playing Texas A&M again, a week after the Aggies earned a 4-3 victory in the final match of the regular season in College Station.

No. 2 seed Georgia rolled into the final, beating No. 3 seed Oklahoma 4-0, but Texas A&M had a much tougher semfinal victory, beating No. 4 seed and host Auburn 4-3, with Daria Smetannikov getting the clinch for the Aggies at line 5, with a 3-6, 6-3, 6-3 win over Ava Esposito.

Georgia and Texas A&M have split two decisions this year, after Georgia beat Texas A&M three times in 2024, including in the SEC conference tournament final, only to lose to the Aggies in the NCAA final in May. 

In the Big 12, Central Florida was the big winner, with both the men's and women's teams advancing to Sunday's conference finals at Baylor. 

The men, seeded No. 4, beat top seed TCU 4-3, coming from 3-0 down to defeat the short-handed Horned Frogs. TCU has been playing without an injured Pedro Vives for some time and Cooper Woestendick wasn't able to play today, but things got even worse for TCU when Albert Pedrico had to retire with a injury at 2-3 in the third set at line 3.

Central Florida will play No. 2 seed Arizona, who beat host Baylor 4-2 in the other semifinal. Central Florida is 2-0 this year against Arizona.

The second-seeded UCF women's 4-3 win over Oklahoma State came down to a third-set tiebreaker at line 1, with Olivia Lincer saving four match points serving at 4-5, 0-40, then coming back to beat OSU's Melisa Ercan 3-6, 6-4, 7-6(3). 

UCF will play top seed Texas Tech in the final, after Tech's 4-2 win over host Baylor. Texas Tech defeated UCF 4-1 last month in conference play.

All Sunday's conference finals are available at ESPN+ or SEC/ACC Networks.

Emilio Nava continues his run through the ATP Challenger Circuit, beating Mathys Erhard of France 6-2, 6-4 in today's semifinal in Tallahassee to reach his fourth consecutive Challenger final. Nava will face former University of Virginia All-American Chris Rodesch of Luxembourg, who beat Andrea Collarini of Argentina 6-2, 1-6, 6-4. 

In the doubles final, the Canadian team of Liam Draxl(Kentucky) and Cleeve Harper(Texas) won their fifth Challenger title, with the No. 2 seeds defeating unseeded Jamie Cerretani(Brown) and George Goldhoff 6-2, 6-3.

At the ATP 500 in Munich, Ben Shelton(Florida) is the first American man since Andre Agassi in 2002(Rome) to reach an ATP clay final above the 250 level, after the No. 2 seed defeated Francisco Cerundolo(South Carolina) of Argentina 2-6, 7-6(7), 6-4 today. Shelton will play top seed Alexander Zverev of Germany in Sunday's final.