By Jim Durham
Lexington Challenger Media Director
For the second time in the 14-year history of the joint men’s/women’s events at the $100,000 USTA Fifth Third Bank Tennis Championships, the No. 1 seeds prevailed in the Sunday finals.
While replicating the front-running feats of Hyung-Taik Lee and Camille Pin from five years ago, Carsten Ball and Kurumi Nara made personal history – each won their first $50K Challenger level tournament.
Nara, the 18-year-old from Osaka, Japan, may be the nearer to Top 100 status after stopping second-seeded Stephanie Dubois of Canada 6-4, 6-4. Ball, who didn’t drop a set all week, outworked fifth-seeded Jesse Levine 6-4, 7-6 (1).
Nara came to Lexington riding the crest of a runner-up of finish in the (Dallas) Grapevine Challenger and No. 112 ranking. And, now – beaming with confidence – she’s headed to a bigger WTA Tour event in San Diego this week.
Dubios, the Lexington champ in ’07 and now a two-time runner-up here, put a few doubts in her 5-foot opponent’s mind breaking her serve right out of the gate for a 2-0 lead. But, as the eventual winner did all week, Nara broke back and then a second time. She then served out the set at love, tactfully punctuating the air with mini-fist pumps after each point.
Dubois got the early break again in the second set for a 3-1 lead, but Nara broke back before a short downpour and delay with the fiery Canadian ahead 4-3. Once play resumed, Nara came out firing for a hold, a break and a 5-4 lead. But, on double match point, she bounced a second serve to the net, then plunked the next point meekly into the net (“I very nervous,” she said later). A third match point was stopped by the tape, but on the fourth try she creamed a backhand winner down the line.
Could she have thinking of missed opportunities in the second set of her semi that gave Rebecca Marino a chance at a third set? Her coach, Taka Terachi, told Nara during the rain delay, “Just try to win three games. But, if it’s a set apiece that’s okay…maybe try again.”
Nara wasn’t about to let the final go three, though, against the 23-year-old Dubois – a player of all four Grand Slam events with a hghest ranking of 95 in the world two years ago. The Top 100 is certainly in Nara’s sights, but, her coach said, “She has to improve her tactics to win at the WTA level…and then our goal is Top 50.”
Carsten Ball, 23, may not be quite the fast-rising star tiny Nara is, but the 6-foot-6 Aussie is finally a Challenger singles winner – not just Chris Guccione’s doubles partner and Davis Cup teammate. The top seed and fifth-seeded Jesse Levine took turns as left-handed surgeons in the Boone Tennis Center stadium, but it was Ball who hit the big shots when he had to – especially when trailing 4-1 in the second set and then again at double set-point against at 4-5 to hold. In the tiebreaker, Levine dumped an easy volley winner into the net on the first point – and the end was near, as he practically crumbled from there on.
“I did a better job of holding in my emotions this week and it paid off,” said Ball, who moved up five spots in the rankings to 122. “I will take a lot of confidence from this.”
Ball is off to join “Gooch” (Guccione) in Los Angeles for an ATP event as “doubles specialists” again for a week. And, since he didn’t make it back to defend the singles points he won there last year as runner-up, that means the elusive Top 100 still isn’t quite within striking distance. “That’s fine,” he said. “If I can stay healthy I’m just one good tourney away from it.”
When the Lexington entry list arrived three weeks ago, Levine had moved up to 115 in the world and seemed poised to once again crack the Top 100. The winner of three Challengers in the past, he has been ranked as high as 94 in each of the past two years.
With the second place finish here he stands to inch upward a bit from his current No. 157.
Both runners-up are now headed to Canada for the next Challenger: Dubois to Vancouver, Levine to Granby.
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