Following the fifth day of play at the 2018 USTA National Winter Championships, part of the USTA adidas Junior National Championship Series, only girls’ 16s top seed Leyden Games (Southern California) still has a chance to capture her respective divisional crown. Games is going for her second national tournament victory on the grounds of the USTA National Campus after winning a Level 2 event last May.

Games once again faced a strong challenge from an unseeded hopeful, as Angel You (Mid-Atlantic) took an early lead and was out in front for the majority of the opening frame. However, Games would eventually navigate her way through a competitive tiebreak, seven points to four. She then used that momentum to build a lead in the second set, holding off any rally attempt from You to prevail 7-6(4), 6-3. Games will go head-to-head with a fellow seed for the first time in the event on Thursday, as she is set to clash with No. 7 Bridget Stammel (Texas), who came through 1-6, 6-1, 6-2 over No. 13 Lan Mi (Eastern) in the only girls’ 16s contest to go the distance.

No stranger to competing at the National Campus, unseeded Floridian DJ Bennett kept up her impressive level of play with a 6-1, 7-5 victory against No. 14 Gavriella Smith (Southern). Bennett has won all five of her matches in straight sets, three of which came over seeded players. Her semifinal foe will be No. 8 Nadejda Maslova (Eastern) after she bested Emma Charney (Southern) 6-1, 6-0 in 56 minutes.

Highlighting other singles action, both boys’ 16s No. 1 Jack Anthrop (Florida) and girls’ 18s No. 1 Anessa Lee (Southern California) saw their title hopes dashed on Wednesday.

Anthrop had stormed his way through to the quarterfinals with ease, but quickly found himself locked in a battle with No. 5 Luke Casper (Northern California). He dropped a set for the first time when he could not mount a comeback from 5-2 down in the first set, but stayed even with Casper until 4-4 in the second. Casper held for 5-4, and in the next game took the final four points on Anthrop’s serve for the 6-3, 6-4 triumph. No. 11 Samir Banerjee (Eastern), who will face off with Casper in the semifinals, along with No. 13 Quinn Snyder (Middle States) and No. 17 John Kim (Northern California) all posted win in straight sets as well.

In a match that was one minute shy of three hours, Anessa Lee was upset by unseeded India Houghton (Northern California) 6-3, 6-7(2), 6-2. Houghton broke Lee in her final three service games of the first set, but Lee staked herself a 3-1 advantage in the second. Houghton would immediately get back on serve, where both players held until they exchanged breaks at 5-5 to force a tiebreak, which easily went the way of Lee. Houghton once again displayed a stellar return game in the decisive third frame, securing three more breaks.

Next up for Houghton is No. 3 Orlando native Alana Wolfberg, who has looked solid from the opening day of play. She posted her third win in which she gave away a mere four games, ousting Casie Wooten (Southern California) 6-3, 6-1. In the other semifinal, No. 4 Connie Ma (Northern California) and No. 8 Carly Briggs (Southern) will be across the net from each other; Ma defeated No. 12 Gianna Pielet (Southwest) 6-1, 6-4 Wednesday and Briggs knocked off No. 2 Zoe Howard (Mid-Atlantic) 6-4, 6-2.

Wednesday’s longest match featured No. 9 Zachery Lim (Northern California) and No. 17 Joshua Raab (Southern) battling in boys’ 18s action. The opening set alone lasted nearly 90 minutes before Raab finally claimed it in a tiebreak, seven points to five. It appeared he was in position to put some distance between himself and Lim in the second, but Lim hung in as the second frame was also decided in a tiebreak, this time going in Lim’s favor by the same margin. That fueled a more one-sided third and final set, where Lim did not look back on his way to a 6-2 effort.

Lim’s semifinal opponent, No. 14 Daniel Milavsky (New England) survived a similar match on the day. He was forced to rally when No. 10 Aryan Chaudhary (Northern California) won the first set 6-3 on the strength of taking four of the last five games. The second saw the two competitors struggle on serve, resulting in six breaks overall, including one from Milavsky when Chaudhary served for the match at 5-3. The back-and-forth frame eventually ended in a tightly-contested tiebreak, where Milavsky stayed alive eight points to six. The third played out in stark contrast to that, with a break at love by Milavsky at 3-2 was the one and only break in the 6-3 score line.

It was much smoother sailing for No. 4 Logan Zapp (Florida), who has enjoyed success in several previous tournaments hosted by the National Campus, and No. 17 Ishaan Ravichander. Zapp proved too much for Karl Lee (Northern California), winning 6-4, 6-3, and Ravichander breezed by No. 17 Hunter Heck (Northern) 6-1, 6-2.

Thursday will also see the boys’ and girls’ 16s championship matches take place. On the boys’ side, No. 12 Jacob Bickersteth (Midwest) and Billy Suarez (Eastern) are set to play No. 14 Banerjee and Louis Cloud (Texas) thanks to both winning in straight sets in the semifinals. For the girls’ division, top seeds Ava Catanzarite (Middle States) and Avery Durham (Southern) are just one win away from the title. Standing in their way is the fourth-seeded Southern tandem of Carrie Beckman and Charney. The boys’ and girls’ 18s draws are at the semifinal stage going into Thursday.

Play continues at 9 a.m. Live scoring for all singles along with doubles semifinals, finals and third-place playoff contests can be found here.

For more information on the 2018 USTA National Winter Championships, click here.