NCAA Women's D-I Super Regionals to Feature Four Unseeded Teams, with No. 6 Oklahoma Upset; Defending Champion TCU Men Escape; Osuigwe Reaches W100 Bonita Springs Final; All-USA Final at M15 Orange Park

More than 11 hours after the first NCAA Division I Regional Championship began Saturday, a dramatic day of play ended in Texas, with the two defending champions, the TCU men and Texas A&M women, both No. 2 seeds this year, hanging on to advance to the Super Regionals.

Earlier in the day, four unseeded women's team reached next week's Super Regionals, including Oklahoma State, who took out No. 6 seed Oklahoma 4-2 in Norman after dropping the doubles point and four first sets. The Cowgirls, who had suffered a crushing loss to Tennessee in the Super Regional at home last year after entering the match undefeated, have had a disappointing year, and even with the mid-season addition of Melisa Ercan to assume the No. 1 spot in their lineup, they had still not developed any momentum. But it was Ercan, after suffering a crushing loss in the Big 12 tournament two weeks ago, who pulled off the remarkable comeback today. Trailing Alina Shcherbinina 6-0, 4-0, Ercan won 13 of the next 16 games for a 0-6, 7-5, 6-2 win that clinched the match.

As the team with the higher ranking, Oklahoma State will host the first ever Super Regional between two unseeded teams, after Stanford took out No. 11 seed Texas Tech 4-1 in Lubbock. The Super Regional format began in 2019, but due to Covid, this is its fifth year, with no tournament in 2020 and 16-team fields in Lake Nona in 2021 due to pandemic restrictions still in place on various campuses.

The other two unseeded teams will travel to the top two seeds for their Super Regionals, with Cal, a 4-0 winner over No. 16 Washington in Seattle, going to Georgia[1] and UCLA, who beat No. 15 seed Vanderbilt in the only women's match to go 4-3, traveling to Texas A&M.  

Final minutes in Nashville were uncomfortable to watch, with Vanderbilt freshman Sophia Webster, whose mother Stella Sampras Webster coaches UCLA, in a third-set tiebreaker with Ahmani Guichard at line 5 to decide the match. Webster, who led 5-3 in the third set and 6-4 in the tiebreaker, couldn't convert her two match points, with Guichard playing aggressively to force and error on the first and putaway a volley on the second. Webster then missed a forehand just long to give Guichard her first match point, and couldn't get a second serve in play to give Guichard the 3-6, 6-3, 7-6(6) victory and a spot in the Super Regionals.

Texas A&M struggled through a lengthy match with UC-Santa Barbara under the lights, but got through 4-1 when Lexington Reed won a three-set battle at line 6. Georgia earned a 4-0 win over Georgia Tech in Athens.

Below are the women's results from today's regional finals, with the pairs for the Super Regionals. Oklahoma State will host Stanford; in all other cases, the higher seed will host.

WOMEN:

*No. 1 Georgia[1] d. Georgia Tech[2] 4-0

Cal[2] d. *No. 16 Washington[1] 4-0

*No. 9 Auburn[1] d. Wisconsin[2] 4-1

*No. 8 Duke[1] d. Florida Atlantic[2] 4-0

*No. 5 North Carolina[1] d. South Carolina[2] 4-0

*No. 12 NC State[1] d. Central Florida[2] 4-1

*No. 13 LSU[1] d. Southern Cal[2] 4-1

*No. 4 Ohio State[1] d. Notre Dame[2] 4-1

*No. 3 Michigan[1] d. Arizona State[3] 4-0

*No. 14 Texas[1] d. Boise State[3] 4-0

Stanford[2] d. *No. 11 Texas Tech[1] 4-1

Oklahoma State[2] d. *No. 6 Oklahoma[1] 4-2

*No. 7 Virginia[1] d. Illinois[3] 4-1

*No. 10 Tennessee[1] d. Pepperdine[2] 4-0

UCLA[2] d. *No. 15 Vanderbilt[1] 4-3

*No. 2 Texas A&M[1] d. UC Santa Barbara[2] 4-1

*host

The men had just eight matches today that determined Super Regional participants, and just one unseeded team advancing, Big Ten champion UCLA.  A popular pick to pull off the upset, UCLA lost the doubles point to No. 11 Cal in Berkeley, but took four singles points for a 4-2 win.

There was only one 4-3 score today in the men's matches, which was this morning's win by No. 13 seed South Carolina over Florida State, which ended with the unfortunate scene of FSU's Erik Schiessel cramping late in the third set of the deciding match, leading to time violations that gave Sean Daryabeigi a 6-3, 6-7, 6-3 win at line 3.

In the only men's Super Regional that is set, South Carolina will travel to Palo Alto to play No. 4 Stanford, who beat Pepperdine 4-0.

Two 4-2 matches rivaled South Carolina's win for drama, with No. 8 Columbia squeaking past Clemson with Hugo Hashimoto fighting off Marko Mesarovic 6-4, 6-7(5), 7-5 at line 4.

And in Fort Worth, TCU rode a roller coaster with Lui Maxted at line 2, who had a 5-1 third set lead slip away before converting his sixth match point to beat Kholo Montsi 6-7(1), 6-4, 7-6(3). 

Still without Pedro Vives, who did play doubles but not singles this evening, TCU took the doubles point and got wins from Cooper Woestendick and Jack Pinnington Jones in three sets, but lost at lines 4 and 5. With No. 6 singles not able to play until a match finished, TCU could have had a relatively routine, if challenging win had Maxted served out the match at 5-2. But he did not, nor could he served it out at 5-4, and when Montsi took a 40-lead serving at 5-all, all the momentum was with the Sooner. But Maxted won seven points in a row to go up 6-5, 40-0, only to see Montsi turn the tables and break him from 40-0 up to send the match to a tiebreaker. The match point at 6-5, deuce was especially painful, with Maxted at the net to put away a Montsi pass, only to have the ball clip the net cord and pop up, and Maxted was unable to adjust, with his overhead attempt finding the net.

Meanwhile, TCU's Roger Pascual had taken a lead in the second set after dropping the first to Asahi Harazaki, and he closed it out during the third set tiebreaker. Maxted took a 4-2 lead with Montsi finally making an unforeced error at 2-all and then again at 5-3. With three more match points, Maxted finally converted, with Montsi netting a forehand early in the point to end all the drama.

Top seed Wake Forest dropped the doubles point, an extremely rare start to a match for them, to Kentucky, but found a way through some very tough first sets to take a 4-1 win.

Below are the men's results from today. The regional finals are in bold; the men's first round match results show the eight matches left to play on Sunday. All results from Friday can be found in Friday's post.

MEN:

REGIONAL FINAL:

*No. 1 Wake Forest[1] d. Kentucky[2] 4-1

*No. 16 Texas A&M[1] d. Rice[4] 4-2

Baylor[2] d. Nebraska[3] 4-1

*No. 9 NC State[1] d. South Carolina State[4] 4-0

Georgia[2] d. UNC-Wilmington[3] 4-0

REGIONAL FINAL:

*No. 8 Columbia[1] d. Clemson[2] 4-2

*No. 5 Ohio State[1] d. Buffalo[4] 4-0

Auburn[2] d. Belmont[3] 4-0

REGIONAL FINAL:

*No. 12 Mississippi State[1] d. Michigan State[2] 4-0

REGIONAL FINAL:

*No. 13 South Carolina[1] d. Florida State[2] 4-3

REGIONAL FINAL:

*No. 4 Stanford[1] d. Pepperdine[2] 4-0

*No. 3 Texas[1] d. Montana[4] 4-0

Cornell[3] d. Michigan[2] 4-0

*No. 14 Tennessee[1] d. Alabama State[4] 4-0

Duke[2] d. Middle Tennessee State[3] 4-0

REGIONAL FINAL:

UCLA[2] d. *No. 11 Cal[1] 4-2

*No. 6 San Diego[1] v UC-Irvine[4]

Southern Cal[2] d. Arizona State[3] 4-0

*No. 7 Virginia[1] d. Bucknell[4] 4-0

Princeton[2] d. St. John's[3] 4-0

REGIONAL FINAL:

*No 10 Arizona[1] d. Harvard[2] 4-0

*No. 15 Central Florida[1] d. Miami[4] 4-1

Florida[3] d. South Florida[2] 4-1 

REGIONAL FINAL:

*No. 2 TCU[1] d. Oklahoma[2] 4-2

*host

The men's draw is here; the women's draw is here.

Cracked Racquets will have streams of the eight men's regional finals Sunday at their YouTube Channel.

Whitney Osuigwe advanced to the final of the USTA Pro Circuit W100 in Bonita Springs Florida, keeping alive her hopes for the USTA's Roland Garros wild card. The No. 4 seed defeated unseeded Elvina Kalieva 7-6(3), 7-6(3) to reach the final, where she'll play No. 8 seed Astra Sharma(Vanderbilt) of Australia. Sharma ended the run of qualifier Katarina Jokic(Georgia) of Serbia 7-6(2), 6-2.

At the M15 in Orange Park Florida, No. 6 seed Tristan McCormick(Notre Dame, Georgia) and No. 2 seed Tyler Zink(Georgia, Oklahoma State) will meet in Sunday's final. McCormick defeated 16-year-old Jack Kennedy 6-2, 6-4, while Zink beat Tomas Luis(Belmont) of Portugal 6-3, 7-6(2).

In the all-USA doubles final, unseeded Ryan Dickerson(Duke, Baylor) and Ty Gentry(Oregon) defeated No. 3 seeds Cannon Kingsley(Ohio State) and Billy Suarez(Tulane) 6-4, 4-6, 12-10.