Friday, July 22, 2016

No. 2 seed Min barely survives in 50K Gold River

   Second-seeded Grace Min of Boca Raton, Fla., saved two match points in a 3-6, 6-1, 7-5 victory over Michaella Krajicek of the Netherlands on Thursday in the second round of the $50,000 FSP Gold River Women's Challenger in the Sacramento, Calif., area.
   The 5-foot-4 (1.63-meter) Min, 22, escaped the match points to hold her serve for 5-5 in the third set. She broke for 6-5 on a perfectly executed backhand drop shot and held serve for the match on a service winner down the middle.
   Krajicek, the 27-year-old sister of 1996 Wimbledon champion Richard Krajicek, was coming off a 3-hour, 22-minute victory over U.S. wild card Sabrina Santamaria on Wednesday.
   Michaella Krajicek has been ranked as high as No. 30 in singles (2008) and No. 23 in doubles (2015). She is now No. 223 and No. 94, respectively.
   Min, ranked No. 158, will play her doubles partner, former Stanford star Kristie Ahn, not before 1:30 p.m. in today's quarterfinals (live streaming at usta.com).
   The 5-foot-5 (1.65-meter) Ahn, who clinched Stanford's 2013 NCAA championship at No. 2 singles, routed sixth-seeded Tara Moore of Great Britain 6-2, 6-1.
   Also, qualifier Valeria Solovyeva of Russia ousted seventh-seeded Mayo Hibi of Japan 6-2, 6-2.
   Solovyeva reached the semifinals of the inaugural Gold River Challenger in 2012 at 19 years old and took last year off to earn a master's degree in sports and health science, graduating with honors.
   Hibi won the Gold River title in 2013 at 17.
   Solovyeva will face third-seeded An-Sophie Mestach of Belgium in tonight's featured match at 6:30. Mestach, the world's top junior in 2011, reached the final of last year's Stockton and Gold River Challengers. She did not play in last week's Stockton Challenger.
   In today's other quarterfinals, lucky loser Caroline Romeo of France will meet 17-year-old Sofia Kenin of Pembroke Pines, Fla., and eighth-seeded Sabina Sharipova of Uzbekistan will play Elizaveta Ianchuk of Ukraine.
   The 434th-ranked Romeo stunned top-seeded Alison Van Uytvanck, who won the Stockton title last week, on Wednesday in the first round.
   Here are links to the singles and doubles draws and today's schedule.

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