The Skupski Brothers, Ken (LSU 07) and Neal (LSU ’12), won their 14th career doubles title as a team with a tough three set win over Purav Raja and Divij Sharan in the finals of the $85K Slovakia Challenger in Bratislava. The Skupskis got broken to start the match and ended up dropping the opening set 6-4 but they rallied in the second set and after opening up a 3-0 lead they took the set 6-3. In the third set supertiebreak, the Skupski Brothers went up a mini-break at 3-1 and would never trail again as they closed it out 10-5. Ken’s ATP doubles ranking is up to #77 while Neal’s is at #85.
Bratislava Champions after winning 4-6 6-3 10-5! @ATPChallenger @FilaTennis @head_tennis @FreewayUKIns #PacificTennis pic.twitter.com/1IyrPHuEgc
— Skupski Brothers (@SkupskiBros) November 12, 2016
Adil Shamasdin (Brown ’05) won his first doubles title of the year, 24th career, as he and Peter Polansky defeated Ruben Bemelmans and Joris De Loore 6-1, 6-3 in the final of the $50 Knoxville (TN) Challenger. Shamasdin’s current ATP doubles ranking of 67 is just 12 spots behind his career high of 55 (4/2015).
Polansky/Shamasdin doubles champions #knoxchallenger pic.twitter.com/u3eVKt5VPF
— KnoxvilleChallenger (@KnoxChallenger) November 13, 2016
Farris Gosea (Illinois ’15) and Cameron Silverman (Elon ’14) won the doubles title at the Costa Rica F1 Futures in San Jose with a come from behind 3-6, 6-4, 10-4 win over Raleigh Smith (Northwestern ’14) and Juan Pablo Varillas. Gosea and Silverman trailed 6-3, 3-1 but they broke Smith and Varillas twice on no-ad points to take the second set 6-4. Smith and Varillas went up 2-0 in the third set supertiebreak but Gosea and Silverman took 10 of the next 12 points to close it out. It was Silverman’s eight career doubles title while it was Gosea’s third.
Marcelo Arevalo (Tulsa ’11*) won his first doubles title of the year, 20th career, as he and Sergio Galdos rolled to a 6-4, 6-1 win over Gonzalo Escobar (Texas Tech ’12) and Ariel Behar in the finals of the $75K Bogota, Colombia, Challenger. Arevalo and Galdos didn’t drop a set all week as well.
¡ Felicitaciones a la dupla campeona!. Marcelo Arévalo [ESA] y Sergio Galdos [PER] #MiloOpenBogota2016 pic.twitter.com/CdWpg3PtCU
— MILO® Open Bogotá (@Tenisgrandslam) November 13, 2016
Finn Tearney (Pepperdine ’13) won his eighth career doubles title as he and Daniel Nolan defeated Maverick Banes and Gavin Van Peperzeel 6-4, 4-6, 10-5 to win the Australia F9 Futures in Wollongong. Tearney and Nolan won their last three matches in a third set supertiebreak and in this one they jumped out to a 5-1 lead in route to taking it 10-5.
Jaremere Jenkins (Virginia ’13) was attempting to win his third singles title in the last six weeks but he lost a tough one to Maverick Banes in the finals of the Australia F9 Futures Wollongong. Jenkins served for the match up 7-6, 5-3 but he was broke from 15/40 and then he was broke again in a one-deuce game to go down 5-6. After Banes served out the second set, Jenkins was broke again to start the third and he never recovered and ultimately went down 6-7, 7-5, 6-2.
Tulane junior Constantin Schmitz entered this week with one career main draw win but he was able to add another four before falling 4-6, 6-1, 6-0 to Gianni Mina in the finals of the Niceville (FL) USA F36 Futures. Schmitz defeated three seeds including 16-year old Felix Auger-Aliassime (6-0, 6-2) with FAA coming off his first career title from the week prior. Schmitz has only played two career pro events and they’ve both come in Niceville, Florida with Schmitz now boasting a 12-2 record (including qualies).
Schmitz started strong but Mina turned it on and finished stronger. Schmitz falls in 3 in final. Fantastic tourny by your #Greenwave ! pic.twitter.com/Yi4fyXa3JG
— Tulane Men’s Tennis (@GreenWaveMTenn) November 13, 2016
Matthew Kandath (Stanford ’12) came close to winning his first career pro title but he and his doubles partner Bartosz Wojnar lost 4-6, 7-6(0), 10-4 to Colin Van Beem and Lennert Van Der Linden at the Morocco F8 Futures in Casablanca. Kandath and Wojnar led 6-4, 5-3 and they had a match point on the no-ad point on their opponents serve but couldn’t get the break and then they were broken from 30/40 while serving for the match. The second set tiebreak was a rout and Van Beem and Van Der Linden broke a 4-4 tie in the third set supertiebreak by winning the last six points.
Johan Brunstrom (SMU ’03) and Andreas Siljestrom (Middle Tennessee St ’07) were seeking their fourth Challenger doubles title of the year but they fell 6-7(1), 7-6(3), 11-9 to Jonathan Eysseric and Edouard Roger-Vasselin. Brunstrom and Siljestrom had one match point up 9-8* in the third set supertiebreak but they dropped the final three points to fall 11-9. There were zero breaks of serve in the two-hour match and only one service game made it to the no-ad point.
7 players with college ties won pro events last week with another 14 finishing as runner-up.
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.
New AD at St. John's was the guy that cut Hartford University's men's and women's tennis programs. He was at Hartford for just over two years!
Andrus, what exactly do you disagree with? These are this week's ATP rankings filtered by players with college ties.
Paul, I am a St. John's tennis alum and was very aware that our new AD cut tennis at Hartford right before he high tailed it out of there. Needless to say I am very concerned. It would be absolutely devastating to me and many of the alums if tennis at St. John's suffers the same fate, not to mention the great group of kids that we have on both teams right now. It would also be tragic for college tennis as a whole to leave have only one legitimate D-1 team (Columbia) in the NYC area. If you, or anybody else, has any ideas to help preempt such a course of action I would be interested to hear your thoughts.
Please add Alastair Grey, who signed a National Letter of Intent today to attend TCU and will be joining the team in January. His singles ranking is 1490 and his doubles ranking is 1377. He was one of Andy Murray's "hitting partners" in preparation for Wimbledon this year.
I saw that signing come through – will add him in this week. Also planning on doing a college ATP doubles ranking next week too.