Cook of Sherman Oaks Advances to Semifinals

Tenth-seeded Lester Cook of Sherman Oaks defeated 13th-seeded Sam Warburg of Sacramento, 6-2, 6-1, Thursday to advance to the semifinals of the U.S. Tennis Assn. Boys’ 18 Super National Hard Court Championships in Kalamazoo, Mich.

Travis Rettenmaier of Fountain Valley, seeded No. 22, lost to second-seeded Brian Baker of Nashville, 6-3, 6-7 (8), 7-6 (1). Cook will face Baker on Saturday.

Ninth-seeded Prakash Amritraj of Encino, who upset top-seeded Rajeev Ram of Carmel, Ind., in the round of 16, faces fifth-seeded Todd Widom of Coral Springs, Fla., in an upper-bracket quarterfinal match today.

The No. 14 team of Philip Sheng of Thousand Oaks and Brent D’Amico of Aurora, Colo., defeated No. 10 Scott Brown of Ballwin, Mo., and Sean Kelleher of Forty Fort, Pa., 6-3, 7-5, to advance to today’s doubles semifinals.

Four Southern California players are among the eight quarterfinalists in the USTA Girls’ 16 Super National Hard Court Championships at Barnes Tennis Center in San Diego.

Robyn Baker of Palm Desert upended top-seeded Nicole Leimbach of Colorado Springs, Colo., 7-6 (3), 1-6, 7-6 (3). Riza Zalameda of Los Angeles defeated Elizabeth Exon of Irvine, 2-6, 6-2, 6-3. Kady Pooler of Laguna Niguel, the Southern California girls’ 16 sectional champion, beat ninth-seeded Ashlee Davis of Anderson, Ind., 7-5, 6-0, and No. 2-seeded Lindsey Nelson of Orange topped unseeded Monica Wiesener of Woodland Hills, 7-6 (2), 7-5.