Gibbs falls to red-hot German in U.S. Open

Former Stanford star Nicole Gibbs, shown during her
first-round win over Aleksandra Krunic in the U.S. Open,
lost to 26th-seeded Laura Siegemund 6-3, 7-5 in the
second round. Photo by Paul Bauman

   Nicole Gibbs became Laura Siegemund's latest victim on Thursday night.
   Gibbs, a 23-year-old former Stanford All-American, lost to the red-hot Siegemund, seeded 26th, 6-3, 7-5 in the second round of the U.S. Open in Flushing Meadows, N.Y.
   Since losing to ninth-seeded Madison Keys in the first round at Wimbledon, Siegemund has reached the semifinals on clay in Bucharest, won her first career WTA title on clay in Bastad and advanced to the Olympic quarterfinals on hardcourts in Rio de Janeiro.  
   Gibbs, who lives in Marina del Rey in the Los Angeles area, lost in the second round of the U.S. Open for the second consecutive year. She reached the third round at Flushing Meadows in 2014, which remains her best Grand Slam result.
   Gibbs turned pro in 2013 after winning her second straight NCAA singles title as a junior.
   CiCi Bellis lives a five-minute drive from Stanford in Atherton. The 17-year-old amateur will make her Arthur Ashe Stadium debut tonight against second seed and reigning Australian Open champion Angelique Kerber of Germany. The match will follow the 4 p.m. (PST) encounter between fourth seed and two-time champion Rafael Nadal and Russia's Andrey Kuznetsov.  
   Another U.S. teenager, qualifier Jared Donaldson, continued his surprising run with a 7-5, 6-3, 6-3 victory over 32nd-ranked Viktor Troicki of Serbia. 
   The 122nd-ranked Donaldson, who stunned No. 12 seed David Goffin of Belgium in the first round, will meet No. 21 Ivo Karlovic, a 6-foot-11 (2.11-meter) Croatian, in the third round.
   Donaldson, a Rhode Island native now living in Irvine in the Los Angeles area, will turn 20 on Oct. 9. He was the runner-up to Taylor Fritz in the $100,000 Sacramento Challenger last October.
   Maria Sanchez, a 26-year-old Modesto product living in Los Angeles, won in the first round of women's doubles, but Bellis lost.
   Sanchez and Mirjana Lucic-Baroni of Croatia defeated Belinda Bencic of Switzerland and Kirsten Flipkens of Belgium 6-4, 6-4 to set up a match against fourth-seeded Andrea Hlavackova and Lucie Hradecka of the Czech Republic. Hlavackova and Hradecka won the 2013 U.S. Open and 2011 French Open.
   Wild cards Bellis and Julia Boserup of Newport Beach in the Los Angeles area fell to third-seeded Timea Babos of Hungary and Yaroslava Shvedova of Kazakhstan 6-3, 6-0. Babos and Shvedova advanced to the Wimbledon final two months ago, losing to Serena and Venus Williams.
   Two players with Northern California connections lost in the first round of men's doubles.
   Seventh-seeded Rajeev Ram of Carmel, Ind., and Raven Klaasen of South Africa eliminated Eric Butorac of Cambridge, Mass., and Scott Lipsky, a former Stanford All-American based in Irvine, 6-3, 6-4.
   Robin Haase of the Netherlands and Artem Sitak, a Russia native who plays for New Zealand, beat wild cards Denis Kudla of Arlington, Va., and Tampa, Fla., and Dennis Novikov of Milpitas in the San Francisco Bay Area 6-4, 6-2.