William Blumberg continued his strong play at the $75K Levene Gouldin & Thompson Tennis Challenger in Binghamton, New York, as the North Carolina rising sophomore moved into the quarterfinals after defeating Denis Kudla (ATP 172) 6-3, 6-2. Blumberg, who got into the main draw via a wild card, won 81% of the points on his first serve and he broke Kudla six times. Blumberg will have the day off on Thursday and will be back on Friday to take on China’s Ze Zhang (ATP 259). Cameron Norrie, who just recently turned pro after his junior season at TCU, also moved into the quarterfinals after he defeated Daniel Nguyen (USC ’12) 6-3, 6-3. Norrie’s next opponent will be the 2013 NCAA singles champion Blaz Rola after the former Ohio State Buckeye defeated Alex Bolt 6-3, 6-2.
Match pt of Will Blumberg’s 6-3, 6-2 upset of 6 seed, Denis Kudla to advance to QF’s of the LG&T @BingChallenger @ITA_Tennis pic.twitter.com/jps994dfHc
— UNC Men’s Tennis (@carolinatennis) July 26, 2017
Six of the eight quarterfinalists at the USA F25 Futures in Champaign have college ties and three of them are current/former Illini. Illinois rising senior Aleks Vukic rolled over Shane Vinsant (Texas A&M ’16) 6-2, 6-1 and will next meet Argentina’s Santiago Fa Rodriguez Taverna who upset the top seed Jared Hiltzik (Illinois ’16) 7-5, 6-3.
Illinois rising sophomore Zeke Clark gutted out a 7-6(3), 5-7, 6-2 win over 17-year-old Lukas Greif in a match that lasted 2 hours and 56 minutes. Clark controlled the third set by winning 75% of the points on his first serve while Greif only won 22% on his first serve. Next up for Clark is Jeffrey Schorsch after the recent Valparaiso graduate ousted Cameron Silverman (Elon ’14) via retirement with Schorsch up 3-1 in the third set.
In the other quarterfinal matches it’ll be Dennis Nevolo (Illinois ’12) meeting Mexico’s Manuel Sanchez while Deiton Baughman, who served as the USC men’s volunteer assistant last season, will face Liam Caruana who spent a semester at Texas two falls ago.
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Over the past week there have been plenty of assistant coaching hires across the country. Below are the ones that I’ve seen:
Jordan Szabo was named the women’s assistant at his alma mater Texas A&M. Szabo was the men’s assistant at Texas Tech last year.
Daniel Whitehead will replace Jordan Szabo as the men’s assistant at Texas Tech. The University of Texas graduate had spent the last two seasons as the men’s and women’s head coach at Concordia University in Texas.
David Secker was named the new women’s assistant at NC State. Secker had spent the last four years as the director of the Advantage Tennis Academy in Irvine and prior to that he was the assistant coach at Armstrong State under current NC State head coach Simon Earnshaw. Secker replaces Gina Suarez-Malaguti who left to take the same position at Virginia.
Michelle Dasso was named the new women’s assistant at her alma mater Notre Dame. Dasso, who was the head coach at Illinois from 2006 to 2015 and then a volunteer assistant at Duke last year, replaces Catrina Thompson who was named the women’s head coach at Minnesota.
Kevin Fulton was named the new women’s assistant at Louisville. Fulton, who was the head coach at Morehead State for 11 years until the program was dropped a year ago, replaces Stefan Naughton who moved into the Director of Operations role after spending the last nine years as the women’s assistant.
Elizabeth Lumpkin Robinson was named the new women’s assistant at Oregon. This will be the first coaching job for the UCLA graduate after spending the last five years playing on the pro circuit. Lumpkin Robinson replaces Tony Giannoni who had been the assistant for the last three years.
Alex Martin was named the new women’s assistant at Furman. Martin, who graduated from South Carolina in 2015, was a volunteer assistant at Wofford in 2016 and then held the same role at South Carolina last year. Martin replaces Christine Johnston who was named the men’s and women’s head coach at Emory & Henry.
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