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Holt Wins SoCal; Pro Circuit Recaps; College ATP Rankings

by | Oct 31, 2016 | Blog

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USC freshman Brandon Holt won the Southern California Intercollegiate Championships on Monday afternoon with a straight set win over senior teammate Nick Crystal. Holt broke Crystal from 30/40 to take the opening set 6-4 but Crystal looked like he’d take the early break lead in the second after going ahead 0/40 on Holt’s 1-1 service game. Holt managed to come back and hold for 2-1 but Crystal would even it at 2-2 after coming back from 15/40 down. Crystal finally got the break, on the deciding point, to go up 3-2 but he wouldn’t win another game the rest of the way. Crystal double faulted the break back to Holt and then Holt held on the deciding point to take a 4-3 lead. Holt broke again and then he served it out for a 6-4, 6-3 win. If you wanted to rewatch the match it is available at this link. 

Holt and Riley Smith were set to play Texas Tech’s Alex Sendegeya and Bjorn Thomson in the doubles final however Texas Tech’s guys couldn’t stay until Monday so the final went unplayed. Full results from all other draws can be found here. 

6 players with college ties won pro events last week with another 13 finishing as runner-up.

Sadio Doumbia (Georgia ’12) won his first career Challenger singles title with a 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 win over the No. 8 seed Prajnesh Gunneswaran in the finals of the $50K Pune (India) Challenger. Four of Doumbia’s five matches went the distance and in each of those four matches he came back after dropping the opening set. Doumbia picked up 80 points for the win and now has a new career ranking of 253. Doumbia had some comments about the win in this article on the ATP’s site. 

 

 
Pro Titles The Week of 10/24-30:
 
Singles:
India (CH) – Sadio Doumbia (Georgia ’12)
 
Doubles:
Australia (CH) – JP Smith (Tennessee ’11)
Hungary (CH) – Andreas Siljestrom (Middle Tennessee State (07)
India (CH) – Purav Raja (Loyola Marymount ’04)
USA – Ruben Gonzales (Illinois ’08)/Ruan Roelofse (Illinois ’09*)
Germany – Andreas Mies (Auburn ’13)
 
Runner-Ups
 
Singles:
USA – Danielle Collins (Virginia ’16)
Czech Republic – Petr Michnev (Hawaii Pacific ’14)
Ecuador – Roberto Quiroz (USC ’15)
Great Britain – Yannick Maden (Clemson ’13)
Vietnam – Rishab Agarwal (Mississippi State Sr)
 
Doubles:
Switzerland (ATP) – Michael Venus (LSU ’09)/Robert Lindstedt (Pepperdine ’98)
Hungary (CH) – James Cerretani (Brown ’04)
USA – Peter Kobelt (Ohio State ’14)
USA – Sabrina Santamaria (USC ’15)/Keri Wong (Clemson ’12)
China – Jacqueline Cako (Arizona State ’13)
Vietnam – Francis Alcantara (Pepperdine ’14)

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During the week of 10/17 to 10/23 there were 9 players with college ties that won pro events with another 10 finishing as runner-up. 
 
Dominik Koepfer (Tulane ’16) won his first career pro singles title with a 6-4, 6-4 win over Luke Bambridge in the finals of the $15K Harlingen (TX) USA F32 Futures. The 27 points earned from winning the event elevated Koepfer to a career high ranking of 620.
 
Marcos Giron (UCLA ’14) won his fourth career pro singles title, but first since March 2014, with a 5-7, 7-6(5), 6-4 win over Cal senior Andre Goransson at the $25K Berkeley (CA) USA F33 Futures. Giron trailed 7-5, 5-3 but he never faced a match point and fought his way back to a victory. Giron was out of commission for 10 months (Nov 2015 – September 2016) due to hip surgery and had played in just three tournaments before winning this one. 
 
 
 

Robert Farah (USC ’10) won his fourth ATP 250 doubles title of the year as he and Juan Sebastian Cabal defeated Julian Knowle and Jurgen Melzer 7-5, 4-6, 10-5 at VTB Kremlin Cup in Moscow, Russia. 

 
 

Alejandro Gomez (Kentucky ’14) won his second consecutive singles title in his native Colombia after defeating the top seed Daniel Galan 7-5, 6-4 in the finals of the $10K Colombia F6 Futures in Neiva. It was the second straight week that Gomez met Galan in the finals and both matches finished with almost identical scores.  

Petr Michnev (Hawaii Pacific ’14) won his second consecutive singles title with a 7-6(6), 7-5 win over Niels Lootsma in the finals of the $10K Czech Republic F8 Futures in Jablonec Nad Nisou. It was Michnev’s fourth singles title of the year, fifth of his career, and each of the last two weeks he’s beaten Lootsma in the final. Michnev now has a new career high singles ranking of 328.  
 
Rhyne Williams (Tennessee) and Connor Smith (Ohio State ’13) won the doubles title at the $25K Berkeley (CA) USA F33 Futures with a 6-4, 6-3 win over Cal senior Andre Goransson and recent Pacific grad Sem Verbeek.   It was Williams’s 11th career doubles title while it was Smith’s 12th.
Pro Titles Week of 10/17-23:

Singles:

USA – Dominik Koepfer (Tulane ’16) 
USA – Marcos Giron (UCLA ’14*) 
Colombia – Alejandro Gomez (Kentucky ’14)
Czech Republic – Petr Michnev (Hawaii Pacific ’14)
Doubles:
Russia (ATP) – Robert Farah (USC ’10)
USA – Evan King (Michigan ’13) 
USA – Connor Smith(Ohio State ’13)/Rhyne Williams (Tennessee ’11*)
Nigeria – Alexis Klegou (Texas A&M ’12)
 

Runner-Ups:

Singles:

USA – Andre Goransson (Cal Sr) 
Doubles:
Sweden (ATP) – Michael Venus (LSU ’09)
USA – Evan Zhu (UCLA Fr)/John McNally (’17 Ohio State commit) 
USA – Andre Goransson (Cal Sr)/Sem Verbeek (Pacific ’16)
China – Jacqueline Cako (Arizona State ’13)
Egypt – Conor Berg (New Mexico ’13)/Mitch McDaniels (New Mexico ’15)
Vietnam – Francis Alcantara (Pepperdine ’14)
 
*attended school but didn’t graduate
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There are 22 current (or soon to be current) players inside the ATP Top 1000 with TCU junior Cameron Norrie (293), Ohio State junior Mikael Torpegaard (337), and Virginia freshman Carl Soderlund (411) each inside the top 500. Cal senior Andre Goransson went from unranked to 908 after his runner-up finish at the Berkeley Futures.
 
There are 126 players with college ties (current/past) inside the ATP Top 1000 with John Isner (Georgia), Steve Johnson (USC), and Kevin Anderson (Illinois) the only guys inside the top 100. There are 6 former USC Trojans inside the top 400 –  Steve Johnson (33), Daniel Nguyen (277), Emilio Gomez (283), Roberto Quiroz (296), Yannick Hanfmann (319), Ray Sarmiento (371). 
 
Schools with the most representation in last week’s rankings:
 
Virginia (13)
USC (13)
UCLA (12)
Georgia (10)
Illinois (9)
Tennessee (9)
Texas (9)
Texas A&M (9)
Ohio State (8)
 

To view the table below in a separate window click here – there are two tabs below – one for current players and the other for both current and former players (combined).

If I skipped over someone let me know – thanks.