Jen Pfeifler Third at the
2010 USTA Florida State Closed Sectional Championships
Acree, Ephron and Neuner Also Have Outstanding Performances
Gulf Breeze's Jen Pfeifler (#2 seed) defeated #6 seeded Lynn Chi from Weston 6-1, 6-2 to win third place at the 2010 USTA Florida State Closed Sectional Singles Championships held June 12-17 at the Florida Tennis Center in Daytona Beach. The State Closed Sectional Championship is the most important Florida junior of the year. The Boys and Girls 10 divisions draws are 32 while all the rest of the draws are 64. So, only the top ranked players in Florida get into this tournament.

The Boys and Girls 10 and 12 divisions were held at Sanlando Park in Altamonte Springs while the 14, 16 and 18 Divisions were held in Daytona Beach.

Ten area players got into the tournament this year and in addition to Pfeiler's performance Pensacola players Reece Acree, Chris Ephron and Will Neuner had terrific results as well. Other area juniors making the trip to central Florida were Pensacola players Jacob Baehr in the Boys 10, Girls 10 players Geetha Velusamy and Elizabeth Nowak, John Nowak in the Boys 18, Austin Racine in the Boys 14 and Navarre's Leah Rojecki in the Girls 16.

Pfeifler played flawless tennis throughout the week winning five of her six matches in straight sets including a 6-0, 6-1 drubbing of #7 Caitlin McGraw of Maitland in the quarterfinals. However in the semifinals, Pfeifler ran into unseeded Kelsey Laurente of Miramar in the semifinals. Laurente, ranked 149 in the world in the International Tennis Federation (ITF) Juniors, had an answer for all of Pfeifler's shots on that day. All in all, it was a terrific week for Pfeifler.

Reece Acree was unseeded in the Boys 16 division and won four matches in the tourney including a 7-5, 6-2 win over #13 seed Matt Browne of Marco Island and a 6-2,6-3 defeat of #15 seed Gustavo Gonzalez of Weston.

Chris Ephron was the 16th seed in the Boys 12 division and really played well the whole week. He mowed down two early round opponents 6-3,6-2 and 6-1, 6-2 before losing a tough 6-3, 6-4 quarterfinal match to #3 seed Alex Del Corral from Doral. In the feed-in consolation, Ephron blasted the first two opponents 6-1, 6-0 and 6-1,6-1. Then he received a quarterfinal default from #9 seed Brian Hutanu of Sunrise, beat #10 seed Vasil Kirkov of Tampa 6-3,6-1 in the semifinals of the feed-in. However, he had to pull out of the finals but had an outstanding week as well.

Will Neuner unseeded in the Boys 18 event defeated Colin Edwards of Valrico 6-4,6-2 in the first round and upset #15 seed Tianyu Bao of Bradenton 6-0,6-4 in the round of 32. Matt Gladstone of Surfside beat Neuner 6-1,6-2 in the round of 16.

John Nowak beat Micah Bailey of Miami 6-2,6-0 in the first round of the Boys 18 but fell to the #9 seed Matt Lasprilla of Lake Worth 6-7,6-2,6-4.

In the Boys 10, Jacob Baehr lost a tough first round match to Matt Fung of Miami 5-7,6-2,1-0(6) but came back to win two Feed-In matches. He beat Trey Whittaker of Tallahassee 6-1,6-0 and Dillon Boshart of St. Augustine 6-1,6-0 before falling to Grey Cacciatore of Gainsville 6-1,6-3.

In the Boys 14, Austin Racine dropped a opening round match 6-2,6-2 to Alex Knight of Miami Shores and a feed-in match 6-0,7-5 to Alan Sweet of Naples.

Playing in the Girls 16, Leah Rojecki lost a close 6-3,0-6,6-3 match to Victoria Bensimon of Cocoa Beach. In the feed-in, Rojecki beat Rachel Klayman of Lake Mary 3-6,6-4,6-3 but then lost 6-1,6-4 to Osprey's Victoria Traynor the #9 seed.

Geetha Velusamy and Elizabeth Nowak both dropped their first round matches but came back to win three set feed-in matches. Velusamy defeated Caitlyn Khan of Ft. Lauderdale 3-6,6-3,1-0(1) but was beaten by #2 seed Emma Decoste of Stuart 6-0,6-0. Nowak won her feed-in match 2-6,7-5,1-0(3) over Jessica Hanflinlk of Ormond Beach before falling 7-5,6-1 to Natalia Vuckovic of Bradenton.

Congratulations to all 10 of these fine young players for representing our area well at the most important USTA Florida junior tournament.