Girls tennis: CdM gearing up for prestigious invitational

Richard Dunn

NEWPORT BEACH - Originally billed as a national tournament, host

Corona del Mar High will instead line up its celebrated girls tennis

players against the best in the state of California.

Following the success of the boys national invitational last March,

the inaugural CdM-Pavilions All-American Classic is expected to be one of

the most competitive girls team tennis tournaments in the nation next

week with 16 schools vying for top honors at the Balboa Bay Club Racquet

Club.

Under the auspices of the National High School Tennis All-American

Foundation, started in 1998 by CdM boys tennis coach Tim Mang, the event

(Oct. 5-7) is considered a yardstick of sorts for the year-ending

national rankings by the USA Today.

Top-seeded Peninsula, the defending CIF Southern Section Division I

and national champion, will open against Edison in the tournament’s first

match (Oct. 6 at 11 a.m.) at the BBC Racquet Club.

Earlier this week, Edison replaced Cate of Carpinteria, which dropped

from the invitational.

Torrey Pines, seeded second in the All-American Classic, plays Newport

Harbor in the first round at Palisades Tennis Club in Newport Beach,

headquarters for the boys national invitational (won by Peninsula).

Several clubs, including Palisades and BBC Racquet Club, have donated

courts for the girls invitational. Park Newport, Costa Mesa Tennis Center

and Newport Beach Tennis Club are also sites.

Host CdM, under second-year coach Andy Stewart, is seeded third and

will play Granite Bay in the first round Oct. 6 at Costa Mesa Tennis

Center.

In the upper half of the tournament bracket, fourth-seeded Menlo will

face Canyon of Anaheim in the opening round. Menlo features one of the

top players in California, Ashley Lipton, who began the year ranked 26th

in the nation in the girls 14s and No. 2 in Northern California.

Menlo of Atherton, the Silicon Valley’s finest girls tennis team,

finished 26-0 last season. Menlo also captured its ninth consecutive

Girls Private School League title, its third straight CIF Central Coast

Section championship and its second CIF-USTA Northern California crown in

a row.

In March, Coach Bill Shine’s boys team advanced to the finals of the

CdM-Pavilions All-American Classic.

“I think the best first-round match might be Beverly Hills and Clovis

West (of Fresno),” Mang said.

In other opening-round matches, Foothill of Pleasanton will face

Susanna Lingman-less Woodbridge, Dana Hills will take on San Marino and

Troy, the CIF Southern Section Division II runner-up last year, will

square off against Monta Vista of Cupertino.

The format for the girls is different than the boys’ eight-game pro

sets. Teams will play six singles and three doubles matches, each worth

one point. A total of nine points is possible in a match.

The championship match is slated for Oct. 7 at 6 p.m. at the BBC

Racquet Club. The semifinals are that day at 11 a.m.

Pending commitments from the players to compete, Iris Ichim of Beverly

Hills and Luana Magnani of San Marino will join Lipton and CdM sophomore

Anne Yelsey as the top players in the invitational.

Yelsey, Kim Singer, Brittany Holland and Leslie Damion lead the Sea

Kings, the top-ranked team in Orange County.