Klinger, Arbuthnott reach NCAA singles round of 16

   Only Cameron Klinger and Emily Arbuthnott survived a brutal day for Northern California players on Thursday in the NCAA Singles and Doubles Championships in Winston-Salem, N.C.
   Klinger, a Vanderbilt junior from San Jose, and Arbuthnott, a Stanford sophomore from England, reached today's singles round of 16.
   Klinger dismissed Mitch Harper of Virginia Tech 6-3, 6-2, and Arbuthnott held off Josie Kuhlman of Florida 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 two days after helping the Cardinal win the NCAA title. Kuhlman reached the 2015 semifinals as a freshman.
   Klinger, who upset 9-16 seed Alex Knight of Michigan 6-4, 6-0 in the first round, is scheduled to face second-seeded William Blumberg, a North Carolina sophomore who advanced to last year's final. Arbuthnott will take on Astra Sharma, a 9-16 seed from NCAA runner-up Vanderbilt. Both matches are scheduled for 7 a.m. PDT and will be streamed live.
   Sharma, a redshirt senior from Australia, has lost only two games in two matches.
   No. 9-16 seed Michaela Gordon, a Stanford freshman from Saratoga in the San Francisco Bay Area, lost to Gabriela Talaba of Texas Tech 6-1, 3-6, 7-6 (5) in the second round.
   Billy Griffith, a Cal senior from Fresno, bowed out to Jose Salazar of Arkansas 6-1, 7-5 after ousting eighth-seeded Ryotaro Matsumura of Kentucky in the first round on Wednesday.
   Arbuthnott and Gordon, seeded third in doubles, fell to Chandler Carter and Emma Davis of Wake Forest 6-3, 6-3 in the opening round.
   Other results of matches involving NorCal players:
   Alfredo Perez (9-16), Florida, def. Victor Pham (Saratoga), Columbia, 6-1, 6-2 in the second round.
   Fernanda Contreras (8), Vanderbilt, def. Felicity Maltby (Sunnyvale), Texas Tech, 6-1, 6-1 in the second round.
   Johannes Ingildsen and Perez (4), Florida, def. Tom Fawcett and Axel Geller, Stanford, 3-6, 7-6 (6), 10-4 in the first round.
   Blumberg and Robert Kelly (2), North Carolina, def. Griffith and J.T. Nishimura (San Jose), Cal, 6-4, 6-4 in the first round.
   Austin Rapp and Keegan Smith, UCLA, def. Klinger and Billy Rowe, Vanderbilt, 6-3, 6-3 in the first round.
   Alexa Bortles and Arianne Hartono (5-8), Mississippi, def. Georgia Lawson and Emma Wilson, Fresno State, 7-6 (4), 6-2 in the first round. 

Miller saves match point, wins NorCal Junior title

   SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Saving a match point, top-seeded Alaina Miller of Saratoga edged second-seeded Rachel Chong of Danville 4-6, 6-1, 7-6 (6) today for the girls 18 singles title in the NorCal Junior Excellence tournament at the Rio Del Oro Racquet Club.
   Miller double-faulted to trail 6-5 in the tiebreaker. But the 15-year-old, who slugs the ball with two fists on both sides, pulled even with an inside-out forehand after a long rally.
   Miller, ranked fifth nationally in the 16s, won the next point with another inside-out forehand and closed out the match when Chong, 17, netted a forehand return of a soft first serve.
   Fourth-seeded Adrian Chamdani of Santa Clara won the boys 18 singles title when unseeded Andrew Gu of El Cerrito retired with a sore elbow while trailing 6-3, 4-1.
   Gu was coming off a long 6-4, 4-6, 6-2 victory over second-seeded Cameron Klinger of Elk Grove on Saturday.
   It was the third injury-related victory of the tournament for Chamdani, a hard hitter with a sensational one-handed backhand. Riley Scott of Salinas retired while trailing 6-3, 4-2 in the second round, and top-seeded J.T. Nishimura of San Jose defaulted in the semifinals with a back problem. Nishimura is headed to Cal in the fall.
   In addition to Klinger, Gu knocked off the No. 3 and No. 5 seeds. A win over Chamdani would have made it No. 2, No. 3, No. 4 and No. 5 for Gu, who has verbally committed to Santa Clara.
   Please see below for results of the singles and doubles finals in all age groups.
   USTA 30 Indoors -- Top-seeded Clayton Almeida of West Palm Beach, Fla., outlasted unseeded Brett Van Linge of San Luis Obispo 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 to reach the men's singles final of the USTA National Men's, Women's & Mixed 30 Indoor Championships at the Spare Time Indoor Tennis Center in the Sacramento suburb of Gold River.
   Almeida, 33, will play second-seeded Jan Tiilikainen of Reno for the title on Monday at 9 a.m. Tiilikainen, a four-time champion at 42, dominated third-seeded Michael Kwong of Woodland 6-1, 6-2.
   Heather Nobler of Lincoln, Neb., improved to 2-0 in women's round-robin singles with a 6-2, 6-3 victory over Amy McCampbell (0-2) of Austin, Texas. In the other match, Marisue Jacutin-Mariona of Los Altos (1-1) defeated Petra Wallace (1-1) of Sacramento 6-3, 6-1.
   Play concludes on Monday at 9 a.m. with Nobler facing Wallace and Jacutin-Mariona meeting McCampbell.

NORCAL JUNIOR EXCELLENCE

At Rio Del Oro Racquet Club in Sacramento, Calif.

Finals

Boys singles

   18 -- Adrian Chamdani (4), Santa Clara, def. Andrew Gu, El Cerrito, 6-3, 4-1, retired. 
   16 -- Victor Pham (2), Saratoga, def. Conrad Russell (3), Palo Alto, 6-2, 6-2. 
   14 -- Jenson Brooksby (1), Sacramento, def. Stevie Gould (2), Corte Madera, 6-0, 6-2. 

   12 -- Stefan Leustian (2), Mather, def. Alex Lin (5), Granite Bay, 6-1, 7-6 (4). 

Girls singles

   18 -- Alaina Miller (1), Saratoga, def. Rachel Chong (2), Danville, 4-6, 6-1, 7-6 (6). 
   16 -- Jillian Taggart, Fair Oaks, def. Niluka Madurawe, Sunnyvale, 6-4, 6-2.
   14 -- Katie Volynets (1), Walnut Creek, def. Stephanie Nguyen (5), Fremont, 6-1, 6-2.
   12 -- Muskan Mahajan (2), San Ramon, def. Azaria Hayes (1), Pinole, 1-6, 6-1 [10-4].

Boys doubles

   18 -- Adrian Chamdani, Santa Clara, and Andrew Gu (3), El Cerrito, def. Zachary Hewlin, Los Gatos, and Everett Maltby (1), Sunnyvale, 8-6.
   16 -- Joseph Conlin, Alameda, and Jayson Fung (1), San Francisco, def. Daly Meinert, Fresno, and Conrad Russell, Palo Alto, 8-2.
   14 -- Jenson Brooksby, Sacramento, and Aditya Singh (2), Cupertino, def. Scott Bout, Los Gatos, and Dean Stratakos (4), Saratoga, 8-3.
   12 -- Stefan Leustian, Mather, and Aidan Mayo (1), Roseville, def. Mason Fung, San Francisco, and Jason Holland-Morrison (2), Elk Grove, 8-6.

Girls doubles

   18 -- Paige Cline, Kentfield, and Darya Possokhova (3), San Francisco, def. Kristy Jorgensen, San Carlos, and Vanessa Nommensen (1), San Jose, 8-5.
   16 -- Jillian Taggart, Fair Oaks, and Elena Van Linge, Menlo Park, def. Carina Burdick, Los Altos, and Christine McCarthy (3), Menlo Park, 8-3.
   14 -- Nadia Ghaffari, Los Altos, and Jenna Schlatter (1), Saint Helena, def. Stephanie Nguyen, Fremont, and Julia Pham (2), Los Altos Hills, 8-6.
   12 -- Katherine Duong, Cupertino, and Molly Heber (1), Mill Valley, def. Azaria Hayes, Pinole, and Angela Huang (2), Piedmont, 8-4.

Gold River Challenger champ signs with UCLA

Mayo Hibi, 17, of Irvine is ranked No. 232 in the world.
Photo by Paul Bauman

   Professional tennis can wait for Mayo Hibi.
   The 17-year-old Los Angeles-area resident, who won Challengers in the Sacramento area and Las Cruces, N.M., this year as an amateur, signed a letter of intent last week to attend UCLA.
   Ranked No. 232 in the world, Hibi is rated as the No. 1 recruit in this year's class by Tennisrecruiting.net. She won consecutive titles in the Las Cruces $25,000 Women's Challenger in June and the $50,000 FSP Gold River Women's Challenger in July.
   Only 5-foot-5 (1.65 meters) and 117 pounds (53 kilograms), Hibi won the U.S. Open National Playoff in August to earn a wild card into women's qualifying at the year's last Grand Slam tournament. She lost to 13th-seeded Anastasia Rodionova, a former Sacramento Capital in World TeamTennis from Australia, in the second round but reached the junior girls semifinals in Flushing Meadows, N.Y.
   Hibi plays for her native Japan but has lived in California since she was 2 1/2, first in the San Francisco suburb of Foster City and for the past 12 years in Irvine.             
   Hibi's father, a sales manager for a branch of a Japanese music company, taught her an old-school game featuring a one-handed backhand and occasional volleys.
   "My dad liked that style more than the modern game," Hibi said in July. "Since I'm not going to be 6-foot tall like Maria Sharapova, since I'm going to be one of the shortest and smallest players on the tour, my dad knew I had to do something different from everyone else to become one of the top players like Justine Henin. She (had) an all-court game."
   UCLA is coached by Stella Sampras Webster, the older sister of Pete Sampras.
   The Bruins won their only NCAA women's tennis team title in 2008 with the help of sophomore Yasmin Schnack of Elk Grove in the Sacramento area.
   UCLA reached the semifinals of this year's NCAAs, losing a 4-3 heartbreaker to Texas A&M in Urbana, Ill. The Bruins' Chanelle Van Nguyen led Ines Deheza 4-2 in the third set of the deciding match at No. 4 singles before falling 6-3, 6-7 (9), 6-4. The Aggies then lost to Stanford in the final.
   The UCLA men's team features freshman Mackenzie McDonald of Piedmont, a suburb of Oakland.
   Other signings -- The Cal men added William Griffith of Fresno and J.T. Nishimura of San Jose.
   Griffith is ranked third and Nishimura 44th in this year's class by Tennisrecruiting.net. They played doubles together in the USTA Boys 18 National Championships in August, reaching the semifinals.
   The Cal women signed Australian Lyann Hoang, who won a bronze medal in the 2010 World Junior Teams Competition in the Czech Republic. She has captured seven national junior doubles titles and one in singles.
   Lani-Rae Green, from Kekaha on the Hawaiian island of Kauai, became the first member of the UC Davis women's class. Green has earned eight varsity letters in four sports (tennis, cross country, swimming, and track and field).