Zheng Claims First Challenger Title, Van Loben Sels and Day Champions in Mississippi; Qualifying Underway at ATP Sumter Challenger 125; Three Cheers for Kristina Penickova

With the USTA National Championships and the ITF 14U World Junior Tennis team competition last week, I had little time to follow the USTA Pro Circuit, but three of the four singles titles went to Americans.

2024 fall NCAA singles champion Michael Zheng, a rising senior at Columbia, won his first ATP Challenger title in his third attempt Sunday, at the 75 in Chicago. Zheng, who received entry via the ATP/ITA College Accelerator program, defeated No. 3 seed Yu Hsiou Hsu of Taiwan 6-4, 6-2 in the final, avenging a quarterfinal lost to Hsu the week before at the Lexington Challenger 75. Zheng reached the final at the Little Rock 75  at the end of May, falling to Patrick Kypson. With the title Zheng will move to a new career-high of 320 in the ATP rankings, and is scheduled to compete in the US Open men's qualifying next week, as the runner-up in the USTA's Collegiate Wild Card Playoff in June.

Zheng fell just short of sweeping the titles in Chicago, with unseeded Ryan Seggerman(Princeton, UNC) and Mac Kiger(UNC) defeating wild cards Zheng and Theo Winegar(Columbia, Duke) 6-4, 3-6, 10-5 in the final.

At the men's M25 and women's W35 in Southaven Mississippi, UCLA rising junior Emon van Loben Sels and Kayla Day earned the titles.

It was the first singles title for the van Loben Sels, a qualifier, who dropped only one set in his seven victories last week. In the final, the 20-year-old from Sacramento defeated former Virginia Tech standout Ryan Fishback 6-4, 6-3.

Unseeded Alan Magadan(UTSA, Texas A&M) and Karl Poling(Princeton, North Carolina) won the men's doubles title, beating unseeded Jack Anthrop(Ohio State) and Alafia Ayeni(Cornell, Kentucky) 6-0, 6-4 in the final.

The unseeded Day, a 25-year-old from Santa Barbara, won her first title in two years, dropping only one set in her five victories. The 2016 USTA National 18s champion, who has been as high as 84 in the WTA rankings last year, defeated top seed Ana Sofia Sanchez of Mexico 6-4, 6-1 in the final.

No. 4 seeds Catherine Harrison(UCLA) and Ashley Lahey(Pepperdine) won the doubles title in Southaven, beating unseeded Hiroko Kuwata and Kyoka Okamura of Japan 6-3, 6-2 in the final.

At the W100 in Landisville Pennsylvania, 2022 Australian Open girls champion Petra Marcinko of Croatia won the title, with the No. 3 seed defeating unseeded Janice Tjen(Pepperdine) of Indonesia 7-6(4), 3-6, 6-4 in the championship match.

Sisters Carmen and Ivana Corley, the No. 3 seeds, took the doubles title, beating top seeds Ingrid Martins(South Carolina) of Brazil and Simona Waltert of Switzerland 4-6, 7-6(4), 12-10 in the championship match. The former University of Oklahoma stars have won four titles this year, with Carmen at a career-high live WTA ranking of 82 and Ivana at a career-high ranking of 116.

An ATP Challenger in Sumter South Carolina is debuting this week, as a 125 level tournament that is not a part of the USTA Pro Circuit. 

Qualifying, which has two byes, including one for ATP No. 57 and top seed Jake Fearnley(TCU) of Great Britain, who would have been in the main draw had he initially entered. Almost everyone in qualifying is an alternate, and there were no wild cards.

In the main draw, ATP No. 54 Zizou Bergs of Belgium is the top seed, with No. 2 seed Kei Nishikori of Japan withdrawing before play began.

Wild cards were given to Kalamazoo 18s champion Darwin Blanch, 2024 Roland Garros boys champion Kaylun Bigun(UCLA) and Alex Rybakov(TCU). Blanch is scheduled to play Murphy Cassone(Arizona State) in the first round Wednesday.

Bigun plays 2024 Australian Open boys champion Rei Sakamoto of Japan Tuesday, with Rybakov facing No. 7 seed and 2019 Wimbledon boys champion Shintaro Mochizuki of Japan.

When I was going through the draws of last week's National Championships to post on the Honor Roll to the left today, I also looked at the consolation tournament draws.

It seems as if the commitment to playing that tournament diminishes every year, and I find that trend disappointing, as I appreciate the determination of players who accept that challenge. 

When Ian Mayew lost his first 16s match in Kalamazoo back in 2023, as a seed, he went into the consolation draw and won 11 matches, with just one a walkover. He told me in the spring of 2024 that that run gave him a huge confidence boost and he won back-to-back J300s to start 2024, reaching 25 in the ITF junior rankings. (He lost early this year and did not play the consolation, citing injury).

This year in Kalamazoo, even the 16s, who typically play in the consolation tournament with an eye to the next year's entry into Kalamazoo, had a startling number of walkovers, with not one of the consolation quarterfinals played.

18s consolation winner Maximus Dussault, who is starting at TCU this month, was a notable exception this year, entering the back draw after losing in the round of 16, and winning five matches, with only one a walkover, to finish fifth.

Although many coaches and officials are proposing the USTA do something about this, the USTA have already added some incentives, which don't appear to outweigh the many other considerations. There are plenty of reasons why a player might decide against playing the backdraw: injury, illness, expense, academics; there are as many reasons as there are players.  Lately, a popular reason to withdraw from the back draw is to concentrate on the final rounds of the 18s doubles, given that a US Open wild card goes to the winners.

This is a long-winded way of getting to who I wanted to acknowledge tonight: Kristina Penickova.  The No. 4 seed last week in San Diego, the 15-year-old was upset in the round of 64, her second match.  She won 9 matches(only one a walkover), all in straight sets, to finish in fifth place, and as the USTA National 18s consolation champion.

And she did all this while competing for the US Open women's main draw doubles wild card. She and Thea Frodin, the No. 2 seeds, won six matches amidst all the two-a-day singles matches Penickova was playing, claiming the title and wild card Sunday with a 6-4, 7-5 victory over Aya Manning and Catherine Rennard. 

Congratulations to Penickova for demonstrating admirable resilience and stamina in taking on the challenges inherent in competing for a National Championship. I hope others see the benefit in following her lead.