Doubles champs to play for Redding singles title

Jennifer Brady, left, and Lauren Embree won
the doubles title in the Redding Challenger.
Photo by Stephen Campbell

   Jennifer Brady and Lauren Embree won the doubles title in The Ascension Project $25,000 Women's Challenger on Saturday.
   They will play each other for the first time today at 12:30 for the singles title at Sun Oaks Tennis & Fitness in Redding, Calif.
   Both players are unseeded Americans who grew up in Florida but have Los Angeles-area ties. Brady, 19, played No. 2 singles as a freshman for UCLA's national championship team in the spring. Embree, 23, lives in nearby Santa Monica.
   They even have similar world rankings. The hard-hitting Brady is No. 524 (46th in the United States), and the counterpunching Embree is No. 527 (47th in the U.S.).
   Brady beat third-seeded Zuzana Zlochova of Slovakia 6-4, 6-1 in Saturday's semifinals, and Embree routed unseeded Alexandra Stevenson 6-0, 6-2. Zlochova (pronounced ZLOCK-ova) had cold symptoms.

Twins Alexandra, left, and Kat Facey, from Cam-
eron Park in the Sacramento area, fell in the
doubles final. Photo by Stephen Campbell

   The 6-foot-1 (1.85-meter) Stevenson, the second-oldest player in the draw at 33, was coming off a 6-4, 4-6, 7-6 (3) victory over Saratoga's Michaela Gordon, the youngest at 15 years and 1 month, on Friday. The temperature reached 100 degrees (37.8 Celsius) on both days.

   Fifteen years ago, Stevenson became the first female qualifier to reach the Wimbledon semifinals. The daughter of basketball legend Julius Erving, she climbed to a career-high No. 18 in 2002 before shoulder problems derailed her career. Stevenson is now ranked No. 515.   
   Embree, a former University of Florida All-American, underwent surgery for torn cartilage in her right hip in January and returned to the circuit in late June.
   Brady and Embree coasted past fraternal twins Alexandra and Kat Facey, UC Irvine juniors from Cameron Park in the Sacramento area, 6-3, 6-2 for the doubles title. Both teams were unseeded.
   It was Embree's second straight doubles crown in Redding. She won last year with UCLA star Robin Anderson.    

Two Americans beat seeds in Redding Challenger

   REDDING, Calif. -- Two former college stars from the United States knocked off seeds today in the first round of The Ascension Project $25,000 Women's Challenger.
   Jacqueline Cako, a 23-year-old former All-American at Arizona State, ousted No. 6 Marina Shamayko of Russia 6-0, 7-5 at Sun Oaks Tennis & Fitness. Wild card Kristie Ahn, a 22-year-old former All-American at Stanford, eliminated No. 8 Fatma Al Nabhani of Oman 7-5, 6-1.
   With the opening round complete, the only other seed to fall was No. 5 Petra Rampre of Slovenia on Tuesday.
   Ahn reached the Redding semifinals in 2012 and won the deciding match in Stanford's 4-3 victory over Texas A&M in last year's NCAA final. She completed her eligibility in May after helping the Cardinal reach the NCAA semifinals and advancing to the round of 16 in singles.
   Al Nabhani, a 23-year-old right-hander, received treatment on her right shoulder at 1-2 in the second set. She and Cako, the top seeds in doubles, later beat Megan and Morgan McCray of Oceanside in Southern California 7-6 (5), 6-4.
   That prevented an all-sisters quarterfinal against Alexandra and Kat Facey of Cameron Park in the Sacramento area. The Faceys, 21-year-old fraternal twins, are juniors at UC Irvine. Morgan McCray, 20, and Megan, 19, played at Oklahoma State in the spring.
   Cako made her Grand Slam debut in the recent U.S. Open, falling in the first round of mixed doubles with  Joel Kielbowicz to Taylor Townsend and Donald Young 7-5, 6-3 in an all-American matchup. Cako and Kielbowicz had earned a wild card by winning the U.S. Open National Playoffs, open to all players in the country 14 years old and over.  
   Cako is trying to reach her third straight Redding doubles final with her third partner. She won the title in 2012 with Sanaz Marand and was the runner-up last year with Allie Kiick.
   Also advancing in singles today was Felicity Maltby, 17, of Sunnyvale in the San Francisco Bay Area. Maltby dismissed fellow qualifier Elizabeth Profit, 18, of Lomita in the Los Angeles area 6-2, 6-2 to earn a meeting with top-seeded Mayo Hibi of Japan on Thursday.
   Maltby and Profit have verbally committed to Big 12 Conference rivals Texas Tech and Baylor, respectively, beginning next year. Profit, a Type 1 diabetic, plays with a small insulin pump attached to her waist.
   Meanwhile, three qualifiers from archrivals Stanford and Cal lost.
   Krista Hardebeck, a Cardinal junior from Santa Ana, fell to second-seeded Tara Moore of Great Britain 6-3, 6-2.
   Denise Starr, a Cal sophomore from Brooklyn, N.Y., suffered a sprained ankle and retired with seventh-seeded Klaartje Liebens of Belgium leading 2-6, 7-5, 3-0.
   And Lyann Hoang, a Bears freshman from Australia, succumbed to third-seeded Zuzana Zlochova of Slovakia 6-1, 6-2.
   Fourth-seeded Tammi Patterson, a 24-year-old Australian, saved two match points in a 7-6 (7), 2-6, 7-5 victory over 17-year-old Akvile Parazinskaite of Lithuania.

THE ASCENSION PROJECT $25,000 WOMEN'S CHALLENGER

At Sun Oaks Tennis & Fitness

In Redding, Calif.

First-round singles

   Kristie Ahn, United States, def. Fatma Al Nabhani (8), Oman, 7-5, 6-1.

   Zuzana Zlochova (3), Slovakia, def. Lyann Hoang, United States, 6-1, 6-2.

   Tammi Patterson (4), Australia, def. Akvile Parazinskaite, Lithuania, 7-6 (7), 2-6, 7-5.

   Felicity Maltby, Sunnyvale, def. Elizabeth Profit, United States, 6-2, 6-2.

   Jacqueline Cako, United States, def. Marina Shamayko (6), Russia, 6-0, 7-5.

   Lauren Albanese, United States, def. Marie Norris, United States, 7-5, 6-3.

   Tara Moore (2), Great Britain, def. Krista Hardebeck, United States, 6-3, 6-2,

   Terri Fleming, United States, def. Karolina Wlodarczak, Australia, 7-6 (3), 6-3.

   Klaartje Liebens (7), Belgium, def. Denise Starr, United States, 2-6, 7-5, 3-0, retired (ankle).

First-round doubles

   Sabastiani Leon, Mexico, and Mara Schmidt, United States, def. Mayo Hibi, Japan, and Danielle Mills, United States, 3-6, 7-5 [10-8].
   Fatma Al Nabhani, Oman, and Jacqueline Cako (1), United States, def. Megan McCray and Morgan McCray, 7-6 (5), 6-4.
   Leila Hodzic and Anne-Liz Jeukeng, United States, def. Roxanne Ellison, United States, and Karolina Wlodarczak, Australia, 6-2, 2-6 [10-6].

Thursday's schedule

(Starting at 10 a.m.)

 Court 2

   Tara Moore (2), Great Britain, vs. Lauren Embree, United States.
   Tammi Patterson (4), Australia, vs. Michaela Gordon, Saratoga.
   Zuzana Zlochova (3), Slovakia, vs. Lauren Albanese, United States.
   Fatma Al Nabhani, Oman, and Jacqueline Cako (1), United States, vs. Alexandra Facey and Kat Facey, Cameron Park.

Court 1

   Mayo Hibi (1), Japan, vs. Felicity Maltby, Sunnyvale.
   Klaartje Liebens (7), Belgium, vs. Megan McCray, United States.
   Kristie Ahn, United States, vs. Terri Fleming, United States.
   Tara Moore, Great Britain, and Tammi Patterson (3), Australia, vs. Sabastiani Leon, Mexico, and Mara Schmidt, United States.

Court 3

   Alexandra Stevenson, United States, vs. Ellie Halbauer, United States.
   Jacqueline Cako, United States, vs. Jennifer Brady, United States.
   Leila Hodzic and Anne-Liz Jeukeng, United States, vs. Ellie Halbauer and Malika Rose, United States.
   Jennifer Brady and Lauren Embree, United States, vs. Tory Parravi and Lauren Stratman, United States.

Stanford's Hardebeck crushed in Pac-12 final

UCLA's Kyle McPhillips, shown in last year's Australian Open
girls doubles event, demolished Stanford's Krista Hardebeck
to win the Pac-12 women's singles title. Photo by Paul Bauman

   Sunday couldn't have gone much worse for Stanford's Krista Hardebeck.
   In the most one-sided final in the history of the Pac-12 Championships, 40th-ranked Kyle McPhillips of UCLA trounced No. 19 Hardebeck 6-1, 6-0 in Ojai, Calif. Both players are freshmen.
   Hardebeck, from Santa Ana in the Los Angeles area, had defeated McPhillips, from Willoughby, Ohio, 7-5, 6-1 in Stanford's 4-3 victory over UCLA on March 29 in Los Angeles. McPhillips also lost to Cal freshman Klara Fabikova the following day but has won nine consecutive matches since then.
   McPhillips became the first UCLA player to win the conference singles title since Yasmin Schnack, from the Sacramento suburb of Elk Grove, in 2010 and the first Bruins freshman to do so since Sara Walker in 2000. Hardebeck was trying to become the third straight Stanford player to win the crown, following Kristie Ahn in 2011 and Nicole Gibbs last year.
   Gibbs, a Stanford junior, competed in the $50,000 Boyd Tinsley Clay Court Classic in Charlottesville, Va., instead of the Pac-12 Championships. She reached the singles quarterfinals, losing to Patricia Mayr-Achleitner of Austria, and the doubles final with fellow American Shelby Rogers, falling to Nicola Slater of Great Britain and CoCo Vandeweghe of the United States.
    Big Sky Conference Championships in Gold River, Calif. -- The Sacramento State women won their 12th straight title and the Sac State men their fifth in a row. Both teams defeated Montana 4-1 and advanced to the NCAA Tournament, which begins on May 10.
   The Sac State women (13-13) extended their conference winning streak to 105 matches dating to 2002. The Hornets' Rebeca Delgado, a senior from Mexico, pounded Heather Davidson, a senior from Rocklin in the Sacramento area, 6-2, 6-1 at No. 1 singles.
   Leading the Sac State men (17-12) was Marek Marksoo, a sophomore from Estonia who drubbed Mikolaj Caruk, a junior from Poland, 6-0, 6-0 at No. 1 singles. Sean Kolar, a sophomore from the Sacramento suburb of Loomis, clinched the title with a 6-4, 6-4 victory over Ethan Vaughn at No. 4 singles.
   Family affair -- Siblings Michael and Ali Facey of Cameron Park, near Sacramento, played on losing teams in their respective conference finals.
   Michael, a senior at Montana, trailed 6-5 at No. 1 doubles and led 7-5, 4-5 at No. 3 singles when the matches were halted because Sac State had clinched the doubles point and then the title. His parents, Mike and Kim, watched the matches at the Gold River Racquet Club, about a 25-minute drive down Highway 50 from the family's home.
   The No. 31 UC Irvine women, with Ali Facey, fell to No. 45 Long Beach State 4-1 in Indian Wells. Facey, a sophomore, lost 8-6 at No. 2 doubles and 6-2, 6-4 at No. 5 singles. Her twin sister, Kat, also is on the Anteaters' roster but did not play against the 49ers.
   Big West Conference Championships in Indian Wells -- The Pacific men lost to UC Santa Barbara 4-2 in the final. The Tigers, who ended their season at 16-9, received victories from Denis Stolyarov at No. 3 singles and Ben Mirkin at No. 5 singles. The Gauchos (12-13) advanced to the NCAA Tournament.

Facing Faceys jolts opponent

   Now Jacqueline Cako knows what Yogi Berra meant when he said, "It's like deja vu all over again."
   Cako had a surreal experience when she faced the Faceys back to back in singles qualifying for the recent $25,000 Oak River Rehab Challenger in Redding.
   Cako, a sophomore at Arizona State seeded first in qualifying, beat the 18-year-old twins from the Sacramento suburb of Cameron Park by almost identical scores to advance to the main draw. Alexandra lost 6-2, 6-0 in the first round, and Kat fell 6-2, 6-2 the next day in the second round.
   "It was pretty funny," said the 5-foot-10 Cako, who lost to University of Florida junior and eventual semifinalist Allie Will in the second round. "It's never happened to me. I played on the same court, I warmed up with the same person, and I was following the same person as the day before. It was like the day before all over again."
   Cako, a pre-med major from Brier, Wash., near Seattle who took a year off after high school to play professional tennis, plans to graduate in 2 1/2 years because she's eager to return to the circuit. She reached the round of 16 in the NCAA championships at Stanford in May.
   Cako said the Faceys have "very similar" games featuring powerful serves and two-handed forehands and backhands.  
   The Ponderosa High School graduates received a wild card into the main draw of doubles in Redding. Playing as amateurs in their first professional tournament, they lost to unseeded Julia Boserup, 20, of Boca Raton, Fla., and Malou Ejdesgaard, 20, of Denmark 6-0, 6-4 in the first round. Boserup went on to win her first professional singles title.
   Three days after the doubles loss, the Faceys left for UC Irvine to begin their freshman year on full scholarships.
   Christina Fusano, a 30-year-old Ponderosa graduate who retired early this month after eight years on the professional circuit, has practiced frequently with the Faceys in the last two years.
   "They're really athletic and talented but need coaching and matches," said Fusano, now an assistant coach for the UC Davis women. "They will really develop in college. I'm bummed because we play Irvine. (The Faceys) looked at Davis, but (head coach Bill Maze) only had one scholarship (available)."    
   Somewhat surprisingly, neither of the Faceys named twins Bob and Mike Bryan, the No. 1 men's doubles team in the world, as tennis idols.
   Alexandra chose Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic. "Both play every point, have a lot of motivation and never give up," she said.
   Kat picked Alexandra and their mother, Kim, who played No. 2 singles at Auburn in the late 1980s and coaches her daughters.
   The Facey twins, however, did meet the Bryans at a doubles invitational in New York two years ago.
   Unlike the Bryans, the Faceys are not identical twins. At 5-foot-9, Alexandra is two inches taller than Kat. And whereas Bob is left-handed and Mike right, both Faceys are right-handed.
   Kim and her husband -- Mike, an information technology consultant -- have one other child. Michael is a junior on the University of Montana tennis team.
   When asked if Alexandra and Kat have pro potential, Fusano said: "I don't see why not. They have big games, but they have a long way to go. First, they have four years of college."
   As Berra said, "You can observe a lot by watching."
   WTA tour -- Kops-Jones and fellow Californian Abigail Spears, coming off the women's doubles title in Quebec City, defeated Kimiko Date-Krumm of Japan and Zhang Shuai of China 7-6 (5), 6-4 in the first round of doubles in the $2.05 million Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo.

Rising star Davis bounces back from concussion

   REDDING — Tiny Lauren Davis is handling the big girls in professional tennis just fine.
   Television cameras are another matter.
   It's not that Davis is shy. Rather, in one of the strangest accidents in sports history, the 17-year-old rising star suffered a concussion while filming a commercial at the Family Circle Cup in Charleston, S.C., in April. The wind knocked over the camera, which fell on the 5-foot-2, 120-pound Davis' head. 
   "I blacked out for five or 10 seconds," the sixth-seeded Davis said after demolishing Katie Ruckert, 27, of Vienna, Va., 6-0, 6-0 in 62 minutes Wednesday in the first round of the $25,000 Oak River Rehab Challenger at Sun Oaks Tennis and Fitness. "I didn't think it was too severe, but the pain was excruciating the next day. I got really nervous then. I felt like my head was going to explode. I had headaches for two months straight, but it was never that severe again."
   In other first-round matches involving seeds Wednesday, No. 1 Camila Giorgi of Italy wore down qualifier Tori Kinard of Pasadena 7-6 (4), 6-0, but No. 4 Maria-Fernanda Alvarez-Teran of Bolivia lost to Yuliana Lizarazo of Colombia, and No. 7 Tamaryn Hendler of Belgium fell to wild card Allie Will of Boca Raton, Fla., 5-7, 6-4, 6-2.
   Hendler, who played for the Sacramento Capitals of World TeamTennis in 2008, began cramping midway through the second set. She later complained of fatigue after arriving Monday night from Japan, where she won a $25,000 tournament last week and reached the semifinals of another the previous week.
   Will, a 5-10 junior at Florida, played No. 1 singles and doubles on the team that won the NCAA title at Stanford in May.
   In the opening round of doubles, top-seeded Yasmin Schnack of Elk Grove and Maria Sanchez of Modesto beat Yawna Allen of Phoenix and Jessica Roland-Rosario of Puerto Rico 7-5, 6-2, and wild cards Alexandra and Kat Facey, 18-year-old twins from Cameron Park outside of Sacramento, lost to Julia Boserup of Newport Beach and Malou Ejdesgaard of Denmark 6-0, 6-4.   
   Davis admitted that she missed tennis while sitting out for two months.
   "I couldn't do much other than watch TV. I was bored out of my mind," said Davis, a Cleveland product who trains at the Evert Tennis Academy in Boca Raton.
   Davis returned to competition in her hometown, losing in the first round of a $10,000 tournament. She then won 13 consecutive matches, capturing titles in $10,000 events in Buffalo, N.Y., and Atlanta and reaching the semifinals of a $50,000 tournament in Lexington, Ky.
   Last month, Davis won the girls 18 singles title at the USTA National Championships in San Diego to earn a berth in the main draw of the U.S. Open. She lost to eventual semifinalist Angelique Kerber of Germany 7-6 (3), 6-3 in the first round.
   "Taking time off made me want to come back and do well more than before," Davis said.
   Davis ended the 2010 season on a 27-match winning streak. She beat 6-1 Coco Vandeweghe, another former Capital, in a wild-card playoff in December to earn a spot in the Australian Open. Making her Grand Slam debut in Rod Laver Arena, Davis lost to fifth-seeded Samantha Stosur of Australia 6-1, 6-1 in January. Stosur won her first Grand Slam singles title Sunday in the U.S. Open.
   Davis, who began playing at the advanced age of 9 and turned pro two weeks before the Australian Open, has soared from No. 437 in the world at the end of 2010 to No. 320. She hopes to reach the top 10 eventually in a sport increasingly dominated by big, powerful, athletic players.
   "The thing hurting Lauren is her height, but she makes up for a lot of that territory by being an incredible athlete, very much like (5-8) Kim Clijsters,'' tennis legend and ESPN analyst Chris Evert told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel last month. "The way she moves, she's a great little competitor.''
   And a headache for opponents.