SURPRISE, Ariz. – Upsets ruled the opening day of the 2018 Oracle ITA National Fall Championships.
The top four men’s doubles seeds, the No. 1 women’s doubles team, five men’s singles players and three women’s singles players all went down on Wednesday.
Thursday’s play at the Surprise Tennis & Racquet Complex in Surprise, Arizona, held largely to form for seeded players and doubles teams.
Petros Chrysochos of Wake Forest, the No. 1 seed in the men’s singles draw, had to fight back from a 3-0 third set deficit to advance to the Round of 16, winning the final six games in his match against Florida’s Andy Andrade to score a 6-2, 5-7, 6-3 victory.
Eight of the 16 seeded men’s singles players remain in the draw, including No. 2 seed Christian Sigsgaard of Texas, who won his Round of 32 match 7-5, 6-2 over Mitch Harper of Virginia Tech. South Carolina’s third-seeded Paul Jubb also advanced on Thursday, as he rallied from a set down to defeat Gonzalo Morell Raschiatore of Middle Tennessee State 4-6, 6-1, 6-2.
Vanderbilt’s Christina Rosca scored the lone seeded upset in the women’s singles draw, topping No. 5 Kelly Chen of Duke in three sets 4-6, 6-3, 6-4. In all, 11 of the 16 seeds remain in the field, including top-seeded Fernanda Contreras of Vanderbilt, No. 2 seed and 2018 Oracle ITA Masters champion, Estela Perez-Somarriba of Miami and No. 3 seed and 2018 Oracle ITA Masters runner-up, Evgeniya Levashova of Pepperdine.
Two unseeded men’s doubles teams put on a show Thursday evening, as Pac-12 foes Arizona State and Washington battled in an epic third set 10-point tiebreak. It wound up taking a total of 32 points to decide the match, but ultimately the Sun Devils’ team of Tim Ruehl and Andrea Bolla prevailed over Jack Davis and Piers Foley 3-6, 6-3, 1-0 (15).
In women’s doubles, Pepperdine’s Ashey Lahey and Levashova, the No. 6 and No. 3 seeds, respectively, in the women’s singles draw, defeated Stanford’s No. 3-seeded team of Kimberly Yee and Caroline Lampl 7-5, 7-6 (5) to advance to Friday’s quarterfinal round.
Clemson’s Marie-Alexandre Leduc and Fernanda Navarro took down the No. 4 seeded team from LSU, Eden Richardson and Jessica Golovin in a three-set thriller, 6-4, 5-7, 1-0 (6).
Recently, it was announced that the men’s and women’s singles champions will receive main draw wildcards into a 2019 Oracle Challenger Series tournament.
The 2018 Oracle ITA National Fall Championships men’s and women’s singles finals will stream live on ESPN3 and the ESPN App on Sunday, November 11th, beginning at 10 a.m. PDT/1 p.m. EDT, with the women’s final. The singles championships will re-air on ESPNU on Tuesday, November 13th, at 3 p.m. EDT/12 p.m. EDT.
Friday’s action at the Surprise Tennis & Racquet Complex begins at 9 a.m. MDT, with Round of 16 singles, followed by quarterfinal singles and doubles matches.
Draws, schedule of play, daily recaps and a photo gallery can be found on the Oracle ITA National Fall Championships event page. Live scoring via Tennis Ticker will be available, while TempuZ will provide live streaming coverage from two courts at the Surprise Tennis & Racquet Complex. Links to both live scoring and streaming are also available on the event page. You can also follow the conversation on Twitter by following @ITA_Tennis and @OracleTennis and using the hashtag #ITAFallNats.
