Defending champ Buzarnescu loses early in San Jose

Unseeded Mihaela Buzarnescu, playing in the final of last year's inaugural Mubadala
Silicon Valley Classic, lost to wild card Daria Kasatkina 6-2, 6-2 tonight in the first
round of the San Jose tournament. Photo by Mal Taam

   Defending champion Mihaela Buzarnescu's stay in the Mubadala Silicon Valley Classic singles draw lasted 64 minutes.
   Daria Kasatkina, a 22-year-old wild card from Russia, ousted the unseeded, error-prone Buzarnescu 6-2, 6-2 tonight in the first round at San Jose State.
   Buzarnescu, a 31-year-old left-hander from Romania, fell to 9-21 this year with no quarterfinal appearances in 19 tournaments. Ranked a career-high No. 20 last August, she will plunge 66 spots from No. 58 to No. 124 next Monday.
   Kasatkina has had her own woes, tumbling from a career-high No. 10 last October to No. 40. She is scheduled to face top-seeded Elina Svitolina, 24, on Wednesday. The top four seeds received first-round byes.
   Svitolina, ranked seventh, is coming off her best Grand Slam result, a semifinal appearance at Wimbledon.
   Seventh-seeded Maria Sakkari, who lost to Buzarnescu 6-1, 6-0 in last year's Mubadala final, beat Ekaterina Alexandrova of Russia 6-1, 6-4.
   Sakkari, 24, of Greece will play Japanese qualifier Mayo Hibi, the runner-up in the $60,000 Berkeley Tennis Club Women's Challenge two weeks ago.
   The 23-year-old Hibi, ranked No. 265, edged Hungarian qualifier Timea Babos, ranked No. 126 in singles and No. 3 in doubles, 6-2, 3-6, 7-6 (3) in 2 hours, 48 minutes. Babos had five aces and 12 double faults.
   Wild card CoCo Vandeweghe, playing in her first tournament match of the year after recovering from an ankle injury, defeated 21-year-old Czech Marie Bouzkova 6-2, 6-4.
   Vandeweghe, the runner-up in the Bank of the West Classic at Stanford in 2012 and 2017, climbed to a career-high No. 10 in November 2017. She will play Belarus' Aryna Sabalenka, seeded second and ranked 10th, on Wednesday.
   Sabalenka is coached by Russian Dmitry Tursunov, a former top-20 player who trained in Northern California from age 12 into his 30s.
   Qualifier Kristie Ahn, a 27-year-old Stanford graduate, outlasted Ajla Tomljanovic, a 26-year-old Croatia-born Australian, 6-3, 4-6, 6-4. Tomljanovic reached the quarterfinals in San Jose last year and the final of the 2017 Sacramento Challenger.
   Ahn recorded her first main-draw victory ever in the tournament, which moved from Stanford last year, and on the WTA tour since she stunned top-seeded Jelena Ostapenko, the 2017 French Open champion, in the first round on clay in Bogota in April.
   The 178th-ranked Ahn, a Berkeley semifinalist, will face Belgium's Elise Mertens, seeded third and ranked No. 20, on Wednesday.
   Sixth-seeded Carla Suarez Navarro of Spain dispatched Magda Linette of Poland 6-3, 6-3. Suarez Navarro, who won the doubles title in the 2014 Bank of the West Classic with compatriot Garbine Muguruza, will meet the winner of Tuesday's featured 7 p.m. match between U.S. wild cards Venus Williams, 39, and Bethanie Mattek-Sands, 34.
   In the opening round of doubles, Eri Hozumi and Makoto Ninomiya of Japan eliminated Mattek-Sands and China's Peng Shuai, both formerly ranked No. 1 in doubles, 6-2, 6-4.
   Here are the San Jose singles and doubles draws and Tuesday's schedule. Tennis Channel is televising the tournament.

Svitolina, Sabalenka top San Jose acceptance list

Elina Svitolina, shown en route to the semifinals in the 2015 Bank of the
West Classic at Stanford, has reached four Grand Slam quarterfinals,
including the past two Australian Opens. Photo by Mal Taam 

   The field for the second Mubadala Silicon Valley Classic in San Jose features two top-10 players, two former world No. 1s, three Grand Slam singles champions and both of last year's finalists.
   No. 7 Elina Svitolina of Ukraine and No. 10 Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus top the acceptance list, announced Wednesday, for the July 29-Aug. 4 tournament at San Jose State.
   Svitolina has reached four Grand Slam quarterfinals, including the past two Australian Opens. Sabalenka, coached by former longtime Northern California resident Dmitry Tursunov, advanced to the fourth round of last year's U.S. Open.
   Also entered in San Jose are former world No. 1s and two-time Grand Slam singles champions Garbine Muguruza and Victoria Azarenka. Both won titles in the Bank of the West Classic, which ended a 21-year run at Stanford in 2017. Muguruza took the doubles crown with fellow Spaniard Carla Suarez Navarro in 2014, and Azarenka captured the singles title in 2010.
   In addition, Jelena Ostapenko plans to play in San Jose. The Latvian won the 2017 French Open two days after turning 20.
   In the final of last year's Silicon Valley Classic, depleted by injuries and upsets, Mihaela Buzarnescu of Romania crushed Maria Sakkari of Greece 6-1, 6-0.
   Amanda Anisimova, a 17-year-old sensation, heads the U.S. contingent in San Jose. Anisimova, who won her first professional title at 15 in the 2017 Sacramento Challenger, toppled defending champion Simona Halep two weeks ago to become the youngest American in the French Open semifinals since 14-year-old Jennifer Capriati in 1990.
   Neither Serena nor Venus Williams, who combined to win five Bank of the West singles titles, is entered in San Jose, but four wild cards will be announced in the next few weeks. The four players who emerge from the July 27-28 qualifying event will round out the 28-player singles draw.
   International Tennis Hall of Famers Andy Roddick and Michael Chang and former top-10 players James Blake and Mark Philippoussis will play a one-night tournament as part of the Invesco Series on Saturday, Aug. 3.

Mubadala Silicon Valley Classic Acceptance List

(With world ranking)

Elina Svitolina, Ukraine, 7
Aryna Sabalenka, Belarus, 10
Qiang Wang, China, 15
Elise Mertens, Belgium, 21
Donna Vekic, Croatia, 22
Petra Martic, Croatia, 25
Garbine Muguruza, Spain, 26
Amanda Anisimova, United States, 27
Carla Suarez Navarro, Spain, 31,
Maria Sakkari, Greece, 33
Danielle Collins, United States, 34
Jelena Ostapenko, Latvia, 37
Victoria Azarenka, Belarus, 41
Mihaela Buzarnescu, Romania, 42
Saisai Zheng, China, 44
Ajla Tomljanovic, Australia, 47
Ekaterina Alexandrova, Russia, 50
Shuai Zhang, China, 52
Andrea Petkovic, Germany, 71
Magda Linette, Poland, 75

Buzarnescu blitzes Sakkari for San Jose title

Mihaela Buzarnescu poses with her trophy in front
of two San Jose State Spartan statues and a Spartan
helmet. The inaugural Mubadala Silicon Valley Clas-
sic was held at San Jose State University. Photo by
Paul Bauman

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   SAN JOSE, Calif. — After the inaugural Mubadala Silicon Valley Classic, it's safe to say the tournament has nowhere to go but up.
   Not that there was anything wrong with the event itself at San Jose State. The organizers did a remarkable job pulling it together in six months after the Bank of the West Classic at Stanford abruptly ended after 21 years.
   But Mihaela Buzarnescu's 6-1, 6-0 shellacking of Maria Sakkari in Sunday's final capped a bizarre week marked by the exits of all five marquee players before the semifinals. One came by a shocking loss, two by withdrawal, one by retirement and one by a big upset.
   Serena Williams' stay lasted all of 51 minutes. Admittedly distracted, she suffered the worst loss of her career — also 6-1, 6-0 — to Johanna Konta on Tuesday night in a first-round matchup of former Bank of the West champions.
   The top two seeds, Garbine Muguruza (arm) and 2017 Bank of the West champion Madison Keys (wrist), pulled out on Wednesday and Thursday, respectively, before hitting a ball in a match.
   Victoria Azarenka retired with a back injury against American Danielle Collins in a Friday afternoon quarterfinal, and third-seeded Venus Williams, 38, blew multiple leads in a straight-set loss to the unseeded Sakkari that night.
   As if all that wasn't enough, the fifth-seeded Buzarnescu topped an ailing Elise Mertens, seeded fourth, in three sets in a Saturday afternoon semifinal.
   The Williams sisters, Muguruza and Azarenka are all former world No. 1s with multiple Grand Slam singles titles. Keys climbed to a career-high No. 7 in 2016 and reached last year's U.S. Open final.
   Withdrawals and retirements are common at this time of year. Players are cautious, especially in the heat, with the U.S. Open only three weeks away.
   Today's final was the most lopsided in the 48-year history of the San Francisco Bay Area stop of the WTA tour, the longest-running women's tournament in the world. Four times, the champion had surrendered two games in the final. Most recently, Martina Hingis thrashed both Monica Seles 6-2, 6-0 indoors in Oakland in 1996 and Conchita Martinez 6-0, 6-2 outdoors at Stanford the following year. All three are International Tennis Hall of Famers. 

   The left-handed Buzarnescu claimed her first career WTA singles title at age 30 in her third final, all this year. Unable to play for 2 1/2 years because of two knee surgeries, she earned a Ph.D. in sports science in her native Romania in December 2016.
   Buzarnescu, who also has had shoulder problems, notched her 35th tour-level win of 2018. Before this season, her career total was three. Ranked No. 142 one year ago, she rose four notches to No. 20 with the title.
   "I just didn't give up because I had my closest friends and family who supported me, and the other coach (Fratila Septimiu) I started working with last year, they all trusted me and believed in me," said Buzarnescu, who pocketed $136,695 for the title. "They said I'm capable to come back and reach top hundred, which I never believed would be possible."
   The low point, Buzarnescu said, was "after my second surgery when I got the result and there was nothing good with my knee and I still had the pain. I didn't know what to do anymore. I was seeing so many doctors and doing everything that I was able to do in order to get the pain away, but it didn't happen. That's when I thought that maybe I have no chances to play tennis and I started the Ph.D. because I thought I have to find some other job. I was really sad and depressed that I wasn't able to play tennis."

Mihaela Buzarnescu, who earned a Ph.D. while recovering from two knee
operations, won her first WTA title at age 30. Photo by Mal Taam

   Sakkari, 23, of Greece could not overcome the physical and mental toll of come-from-behind victories on the previous two nights and a case of nerves in her first WTA final. After upsetting Venus Williams, a two-time Bank of the West champion (2000 and 2002) and six-time runner-up, Sakkari rallied from a set and two breaks down to stun Collins on Saturday night.
   "I woke up, and I was still tired from yesterday," conceded Sakkari, who jumped 18 places to a career-high No. 31 by reaching the final and collected $72,835. "I didn't have so many hours to recover, but that's not an excuse. I didn't lose the match because I was tired. She was very good today. I was not a hundred percent. I was not moving great. It's one of my weapons. It wasn't easy after two long matches and very intense days to go out there and be exactly the same person I was the last couple of days."
   Sakkari's 19-year-old countryman, Stefanos Tsitsipas, reached the semifinals of the concurrent Citi Open in Washington, D.C., on the ATP World Tour. Recent wildfires on the outskirts of Athens, like those that have ravaged Northern California the past two summers, have killed 91 people. Arson is suspected.
   "I left Greece 10 days ago, and it was maybe the worst situation we've had for the last ... for a long time with fires, and a lot of people died," Sakkari said. "Me and Stefanos, we made people a little bit more happy. I received so many messages saying, 'We're very proud of you two.' "
   On a breezy, 85-degree (29.4 Celsius) afternoon, the slender, 5-foot-9 (1.75-meter) Buzarnescu was as steady as the muscular, 5-foot-8 (1.72-meter) Sakkari was erratic in their first career meeting.
   "She was extremely solid from the beginning of the match," said Sakkari, whose mother, former player Angeliki Kanellopoulou, peaked at No. 43 in 1987. "She was not hitting winners, but she was not missing. She was serving clever. I was doing nothing on court, so she could do anything she wanted. She took the opportunity because I was not playing good."

Maria Sakkari said her success and that of Stefanos Tsitsipas last week lifted
the spirits of their fellow Greeks after wildfires near Athens killed 91 people.
Photo by Mal Taam

   Buzarnescu — backed by a vocal group of flag-waving Romanians in the half-full, 3,100-seat stadium — triumphed in 1 hour, 13 minutes. The last two games of the first set, one of which Sakkari actually won, consumed a good chunk of that time with nine deuces and Sakkari surviving four set points. But that was all the fight she had left.
   Buzarnescu saved all four break points against her in the match and won 72 percent of the points on Sakkari's second serve (18 of 25).
   Three of Buzarnescu's five singles matches in the tournament went to three sets, bringing her total to a tour-leading 19 this year.
   As for Sakkari, how's this for irony? She crushed eighth-seeded Timea Babos of Hungary 6-0, 6-1 in 56 minutes in the second round. Now she knows how Babos felt.
   "I have to erase it once I leave this tennis club," Sakkari declared. "I play in two days (against 12th-seeded Daria Kasatkina in Montreal), I have to travel tonight, (and) I have to practice tomorrow. You don't have so much time to think.
   "OK, it was a very good week. I lost today, but it's over. Now my mind has to be on the next tournament."

Romanian fans wave flags during Sunday's final. Photo by Paul Bauman

   Buzarnescu, meanwhile, eyes another milestone after cracking the top 20.
   "Maybe reaching top 10 is the next goal for me," she said. "First of all, I need to stay healthy. Then we will see."
   In the doubles final, top-seeded Latisha Chan (formerly Chan Yung-jan) of Chinese Taipei and Kveta Peschke, 43, of the Czech Republic beat third-seeded Lyudmyla Kichenok and Nadiia Kichenok, 26-year-old twins from Ukraine, 6-4, 6-1.
   Both Peschke and Chan, who were playing in their first tournament together, have won one Grand Slam championship in women's doubles to reach No. 1. Peschke took the 2011 Wimbledon crown with Katerina Srebotnik of Slovenia, and Chan captured last year's U.S. Open title with Hingis.
   Here are the complete San Jose singles and doubles draws.
   Here are the singles and doubles main draws, qualifying draw and Monday's schedule in the $100,000 Nordic Naturals Men's Challenger at the Seascape Sports Club in Aptos, a one-hour drive south of San Jose.

Buzarnescu, Sakkari reach San Jose final

   Mihaela Buzarnescu continued her meteoric rise at age 30 today, beating Elise Mertens 4-6, 6-3, 6-1 in the semifinals of the Mubadala Silicon Valley Classic at San Jose State.
   Buzarnescu, seeded fifth, reeled off the last six games in a rematch of the Hobart final in January that Mertens won in three sets.
   The 15th-ranked Mertens, a 22-year-old right-hander from Belgium, had her right forearm taped after losing her serve for 1-2 in the third set today.
   Buzarnescu, a left-hander from Romania, will play Maria Sakkari, 23, of Greece for the first time on Sunday at 2 p.m. California time. ESPN2 will televise the match.
   Sakkari rallied from a set and two breaks down to beat Danielle Collins, 24, of St. Petersburg, Fla., 3-6, 7-5, 6-2 tonight in a matchup of unseeded players.
   "I think at 4-1 in the second, she started really stepping up to the baseline and putting her foot on the gas," Collins told reporters. "It helped her get back in her rhythm and playing more aggressive.
   "It threw me off a little bit. She played some really great tennis, so kudos to her."
   Buzarnescu will play in her third and biggest WTA final, all this year, and Sakkari her first. Buzarnescu also lost to Petra Kvitova in three sets in the Prague final in early May.
   Shoulder and knee injuries, the latter requiring two surgeries, forced Buzarnescu off the tour for years. She went back to school and earned a Ph.D. in sports science at the National Academy of Physical Education and Sport in Bucharest in December 2016.
   Last year at this time, Buzarnescu had not played a main-draw match on the WTA tour. She created a buzz by reaching the round of 16 at the French Open in June, stunning then-No. 4 Elina Svitolina in the third round.
   Depending on the outcome of Sunday's final, Buzarnescu will rise from No. 24 to a career high of No. 21 or No. 20 in Monday's updated rankings.
   "It's something new that I always dreamed about since I was young," Buzarnescu told reporters. "Since I started to play tennis, my dad always used to say, 'You hit once with a forehand, then once with a backhand, and everything will be OK for you.' Easy to say, hard to do.
   "So for me, after all my injuries, it's really a dream come true to get the chance to be at this level and play high-level matches."
   In Sunday's doubles final, top-seeded Latisha Chan of Taiwan and Kveta Peschke, 43, of the Czech Republic will face third-seeded Lyudmyla Kichenok and Nadiia Kichenok, Ukrainian twins, at noon.
   Here are the San Jose singles and doubles draws.
   Here are the singles main draw, qualifying draw and Sunday's schedule for next week's $100,000 Nordic Naturals Challenger in Aptos, a one-hour drive south of San Jose.

Azarenka retires, Venus falls in San Jose quarters

Victoria Azarenka, playing on Monday night, retired from her San Jose quar-
terfinal against Danielle Collins today with an undisclosed "medical condition."
Photo by Mal Taam

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   At least Venus Williams played a full, competitive match.
   In a tournament marked by premature exits, Maria Sakkari of Greece ousted the third-seeded Williams 6-4, 7-6 (2) tonight in the quarterfinals of the Mubadala Silicon Valley Classic at San Jose State.
   Williams, 38, led 3-0 in the first set and 2-0 in the second set and had two set points with Sakkari serving at 4-5 in the second set. It wasn't enough as the Silicon Valley Classic lost its fourth and last former world No. 1.
   After reaching two Grand Slam finals and one major semifinal last year, Williams has gone 2-3 in Slams this year. She won the Bank of the West Classic at Stanford in 2000 and 2002 and reached six other finals there.
   It was Sakkari's first victory over Williams and the first time they have met in a non-Grand Slam tournament. Williams won 6-3, 6-4 in the third round of last year's U.S. Open and in three sets in the second round at Wimbledon in 2016.
   "She's my idol, but now I'm used to playing her," Sakkari, 23, said in an on-court interview. "That was the key."
   In Saturday's semifinals, fourth-seeded Elise Mertens of Belgium will meet fifth-seeded Mihaela Buzarnescu of Romania at 1 p.m. PDT, and Sakkari will play Danielle Collins of St. Petersburg, Fla., for the first time at 7 p.m. in a matchup of unseeded players. ESPN2 will televise both matches.
   Collins, a 24-year-old University of Virginia graduate and two-time NCAA singles champion, reached the semifinals in Miami as a qualifier in March.
   Mertens defeated Johanna Konta of Great Britain 7-6 (4), 6-3, and Buzarnescu beat Ajla Tomljanovic of Australia 6-1, 7-5. Konta won the 2016 Bank of the West Classic.
   Mertens, 22, is 3-0 against Buzarnescu, a 30-year-old left-hander who earned a Ph.D. in sports science in December 2016 while recovering from shoulder and knee injuries.
   Unseeded Victoria Azarenka, who won the 2010 Bank of the West Classic, retired from her quarterfinal against Collins with a back injury after leading 7-6 (4), 0-3.
   Azarenka, who won the Australian Open in 2012 and 2013, has tumbled to No. 108 after having her first child in December 2016 and missing tournaments because of a custody battle.
   Sixth-seeded Serena Williams suffered the worst loss of her career on Tuesday night, falling 6-1, 6-0 to Konta in the first round.
   Top-seeded Garbine Muguruza pulled out of her second-round match against Azarenka on Wednesday night with a right arm injury.
   And second-seeded Madison Keys, last year's Bank of the West Classic champion and U.S. Open runner-up, withdrew from her second-round encounter against Tomljanovic on Thursday afternoon with a right wrist problem.
   The top four seeds received first-round byes.
   Withdrawals and retirements from the San Francisco Bay Area tournament, the longest-running women's event in the world in its 48th year, are common because players are cautious with the U.S. Open starting in late August.
   Here is Saturday's schedule in the Mubadala Silicon Valley Classic.
   Here are the entry list, qualifying draw and Saturday's schedule for the $100,000 Nordic Naturals Men's Challenger in Aptos, a one-hour drive south of San Jose,

Buzarnescu creates buzz with French Open upset

   No. 31 seed Mihaela Buzarnescu of Romania shocked No. 4 Elina Svitolina of Ukraine 6-3, 7-5 today to reach the round of 16 in the French Open.
   Buzarnescu, ranked No. 377 a year ago because of injuries, recorded her first victory over a top-five player.
   The 30-year-old left-hander is playing in the main draw of a Grand Slam tournament for only the second time. She lost to Caroline Wozniacki in the first round of last year's U.S. Open.
   Svitolina reached the French Open quarterfinals in 2015 and last year.
   Buzarnescu next will play No. 13 seed Madison Keys, who topped No. 21 Naomi Osaka of Japan 6-1, 7-6 (7). Keys won last summer's Bank of the West Classic at Stanford and advanced to the U.S. Open final, in which she lost to Sloane Stephens.
   Today's scheduled match between the 10th-seeded Stephens, who grew up in Fresno, and Camila Giorgi of Italy was postponed by rain. They are scheduled to play on Saturday at 2 a.m. PDT (Tennis Channel).
   In the first round of mixed doubles, second-seeded Latisha (formerly Yung-Jan) Chan of Taiwan and Ivan Dodig of Croatia beat Makoto Ninomiya and ex-Cal star Ben McLachlan of Japan 7-5, 6-3.