The first champions of 2026 have been crowned, with the USTA Winter National Championships concluding today in Orlando Florida and San Antonio Texas.Just one of the eight finals played today went three sets, with the boys 18s title claimed by No. 2 seed Ronit Karki after he dropped the first set. The 2025 Wimbledon boys finalist defeated No. 17 seed Andrew Li 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 in more than two and a
My monthly Tennis Recruiting Network column on December's top performances focuses primarily on the winners of the three major junior events in Florida, which makes it a great way to catch up if you weren't able to follow my daily coverage. But the IMG Academy, Orange Bowl and Junior Orange Bowl champions weren't the only players to pick up titles as the year came to a close, with juniors and
2026 didn't start the way that four of the seven No. 1 seeds remaining in contention for the USTA Winter Nationals would have liked, with girls 18s top seed Carlota Moreno the only one to post a quarterfinal victory today in Orlando.Boys 18s top seed and defending champion Shaan Patel saw his winning streak end at 11 matches, with No. 13 seed Noble Renfrow posting a convincing 6-0, 6-1
The quarterfinals are set for the USTA Winter National Championships on New Year's Day, with seven of the eight No. 1 seeds still in the hunt for a gold ball. The boys 14s lost their top seed in today's round of 16, with unseeded Nathan Lee, the younger brother of Tyler Lee, defeating Sebastian Zavala 6-1, 6-3.The quarterfinal matchups in singles:B18s:Shaan Patel[1] v Noble Renfrow[13]Michael
JanuaryMax D Smith, USTA Winter Nationals 12sDavid Bender and Gabriel Marino, USTA Winter Nationals 12s (dbls)Jacqueline Nick, USTA Winter Nationals 12sLucy Dupere and Christina Li, USTA Winter Nationals 12s (dbls)Eli Kaminski, USTA Winter Nationals 14sRafael Pawar and Zesen Wang, USTA Winter Nationals 14s (dbls)London Evans, USTA Winter Nationals 14sAnna Scott Laney and Michelle Lee, USTA Winter
The No. 1 seeds continued to advance at the USTA Winter National Championships, with all eight top seeds reaching Wednesday's round of 16.Boys 18s No. 1 seed and defending champion Shaan Patel will face No. 17 seed Siddharth Bharadwaj and No. 2 seed Ronit Karki will play No. 17 seed John Gentek.Daniel Malacek, the top seed in the boys 16s, will play No. 13 seed Joshua Dolinsky.Girls 18s No. 1
Although all eight of the No. 1 seeds have advanced to Tuesday's third round of singles at the USTA Winter National Championships, another No. 2 seed has exited, along with the No. 3 seed in boys 18s division.Calla McGill, the No. 2 seed in the girls 18s, lost today to Addison Lindsay 6-3, 4-6, 6-4, while Alexander Suhanitski, the boys 18s No. 3 seed lost to Michael Lorenzetti 6-7(5), 6-3, 7-5.
The first round of the USTA Winter National Championships is complete with only one major upset, in the boys 16s. No. 2 seed and USTA Indoor Champion Eli Kaminiski lost to Rafael Bote 7-6(1), 6-2. Bote, who lives in Boca Raton but competes on the ITF Junior Circuit under the Canadian flag, reached the quarterfinals of the IMG Academy International Championships earlier this month.As I
The entry lists and wild cards for the 2026 Australian Open were announced earlier this week, with a dozen US men and 13 US women receiving direct acceptance.The US men, in order of ranking:Mackenzie McDonaldBrandon HoltMichael MmohZachary SvajdaColton SmithNishesh BasavareddyMartin DammTristan BoyerMichael ZhengNicolas Moreno de AlboranMitchell KruegerMurphy CassoneThe qualifying wild cards
The USTA Winter National Championships begin Sunday, with the 16s and 18s at the USTA National Campus in Lake Nona Florida and the 12s and 14s competing in San Antonio Texas.Shaan Patel is defending his title in the boys 18s division, with Wimbledon boys finalist Ronit Karki the No. 2 seed. Not seeded in the girls 18s is Paige Wygodski, last year's 16s champion; not seeded in the girls 16s is
photo via philbo at unsplash.comI'm taking a couple of days off for the Christmas holiday, but will be back to look at the draws for the first big tournaments of 2026: the USTA Winter Nationals, which begin December 28 in Orlando for the 16s and 18s and San Antonio for the 12s and 14s.Have a very merry christmas!
I want to preface these observations with my amazement at how much was accomplished in the 12 months since I first visited the Jimmy Evert Tennis Center at Holiday Park in Fort Lauderdale. On our way to the airport after the 2024 Orange Bowl, the final one at the Veltri Tennis Center 10 miles to the west, we stopped to scout out the JETC, which had not yet been publicly announced as the
My article on the first ITF J500 Orange Bowl at the Jimmy Evert Tennis Center in Fort Lauderdale is available today at the Tennis Recruiting Network, and the videos of the four finalists are below. I'm planning a post on my impressions of the first year at the new site soon, before many of the salient details fade. The 16s videos and all the IMG videos can be found at my tenniskalamazoo
Learner Tien won the Next Gen ATP Finals today in Jeddah Saudi Arabia, beating Alexander Blockx of Belgium 4-3(4), 4-2, 4-1 in less than an hour of play. Blockx did not miss a first serve in the opening set, but Tien made 82% of his first serves, and was the steadier player in the tiebreaker. Tien had won the first set last year in the Next Gen final against Joao Fonseca of Brazil before
Nearly three years after they met in the Australian Open boys final, top seed Learner Tien(USC) and No. 2 seed Alexander Blockx of Belgium will play in another big final at the Next Gen ATP Finals in Jeddah Saudi Arabia.Tien returned to the Next Gen Finals championship match with a 4-2, 4-1, 4-3(3) win over Nishesh Basavareddy. Tien, who is now 4-0 in pro matches against the former Stanford
Six days ago the first Orange Bowl champions of 2025 were crowned at the newly renovated Jimmy Evert Tennis Center, and my article on the singles titles won by Matias Reyniak and Priscilla Sirichantho and the doubles titles claimed by Emery Combs and Olivia De Los Reyes and Sean Peng and Filip Djokic(the only non-USA champion) can be found today at the Tennis Recruiting Network.Below are the
I've been processing videos of the IMG Academy International Championships the past several days with videos of the champions in the 12s, 14s, and 16s available below. The links to the videos of the finalists are below each of the champion's videos. I posted the videos from the finals of ITF J300 Bradenton on Tuesday.
G16s champion Adelina Iftime:
G16s finalist London Evans
Boys
Fourteen-year-old Texan Tristan Ascenzo broke through the domination of the IMG Academy International Championships at the Junior Orange Bowl, preventing a sweep by the IMG winners with a win over boys 14s top seed Mohamed Genidy of Egypt this morning in Coral Gables Florida.Ascenzo, a Dallas resident, lost to eventual IMG champion Genidy 7-5, 6-2 in the semifinals in Bradenton; today's final at
Two Americans are through to Wednesday's finals of the Junior Orange Bowl in Coral Gables Florida, with Tristan Ascenzo competing in the 14s and Evan Fan in the 12s.Ascenzo gave himself an opportunity to avenge his IMG Academy International semifinal loss to Mohamed Genidy earlier this month, while Fan has stepped up this tournament after a third round exit in Bradenton. Fan has also advanced to
The ITF has released the 2025 year-end junior rankings, with American Kristina Penickova and Bulgaria Ivan Ivanov finishing at the No. 1 spot.Penickova won two junior slam doubles titles this year, and finished as runnerup at the Australian Open Junior Championships, but her biggest singles title in 2025 was the J300 in San Diego, back in March. She barely beat out US Open singles and World
©Colette Lewis 2025--Fort Lauderdale FL--Thijs Boogaard of the Netherlands and Xinran Sun of China closed out a successful green clay swing in South Florida Sunday, becoming the first players from their countries to win prestigious Orange Bowl 18s titles in the tournament's 79th year.Spectators were required to choose which of the six 9 a.m. finals to watch at the newly renovated Jimmy Evert
©Colette Lewis 2025--Fort Lauderdale FL--Kristina Liutova had let one match point slip by, hitting a backhand wide at 5-3, 40-15 in the third set in her Orange Bowl semifinal match Saturday with No. 6 seed Anastasija Cvetkovic of Serbia. The second match point ended with a long rally and a mark check on the far sideline by the chair umpire with Cvetkovic pleading that Liutova's ball was wide.
©Colette Lewis 2025--Fort Lauderdale FL--The Orange Bowl is heading into its championship weekend, but if you missed any of last week's daily coverage of the ITF J300 in Bradenton, you can find my recap of the titles for Jordan Lee and Kristina Liutova today at the Tennis Recruiting Network. A third straight jam-packed day of tennis was on the menu at the Jimmy Evert Tennis Center, but when
©Colette Lewis 2025--Fort Lauderdale FL--Wednesday heat and humidity disappeared Thursday morning, with temperature in the 70s and a light breeze providing perfect conditions for a long day of Orange Bowl competition at the Jimmy Evert Tennis Center.When the final match finished under the lights, ten US boys and four US girls had advanced to the round of 16 of the ITF J500, and all the
©Colette Lewis 2025--Fort Lauderdale, FL--Before I get into the action today at the Orange Bowl, which finally dried out after a day and a half of rain, take a minute to look at my Tennis Recruiting Network article on the 12s, 14s and 16s tournaments at the IMG Academy International Championships last week in Bradenton. These weeks in Florida and Mexico that close out the junior calendar are not