LAKEWOOD, Calif., July 13, 2024 (by Steve Pratt)
For Tori Kinard, playing pro tennis continues to be a dream that will not die.
For more than half of her life and over the past 18 years, the 36-year-old Pasadena resident has played in close to 300 ITF-level tournaments in search of that elusive first pro singles title, and on Friday she got one step closer to that goal advancing to the semifinals in her seventh consecutive SoCal Pro Series event this summer.
On a day that saw Irvine’s Learner Tien win his 23rd straight match in a close quarterfinal battle against fellow SoCal 18-year-old rival Rudy Quan at the Lakewood Tennis Center, Kinard needed three sets to come back and beat last week’s Lakewood singles finalist India Houghton, 2-6, 6-3, 6-3.
On Saturday, Kinard faces fellow tour veteran and No. 2-seeded Paris Corley, a 26-year-old from New Mexico who played her college tennis at the University of Arizona. Corley eliminated qualifier Camille Kiss, a Redlands resident who played the past four years at UC-Santa Barbara.
“We’re chasing the dream,” Kinard once told a reporter covering one of her five career ITF Pro Circuit finals appearances in Victoria, British Columbia, on why she keeps entering tournaments every chance she gets.
“I love tennis, and ever since I was a little girl I’ve wanted to play pro tennis,” Kinard said Friday. “For sure, the dream lives on as long as you’re having fun and enjoying it and you love the grind.”
Racquet sports have always played a large role in the Kinard family. Kinard’s father Chris Kinard was a six-time U.S. badminton champion. Her mother, Utami Dewi Kinard, was a women’s silver medalist and her uncle Rudy Hartono is considered one of the most decorated Indonesian players of all-time winning the gold medal in badminton in the 1972 Munich Olympics. Kinard’s brother Travis played for Billy Martin at UCLA and serves as Tori’s coach watching all of her matches in Lakewood.
“Racquet sports is in my blood, and I love being able to play day in and day out,” said Kinard, who was once ranked in the top 350 in the world but because of recent inactivity to deal with some family health issues has seen her ranking slip to No. 1066. “It’s been a long and wild ride, but I still enjoy it and I couldn’t be happier to be able to keep playing.”
In 2014, Kinard lost to four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka, who was just 16, in Midland, Mich., and a year earlier shared the court with three-time Slam finalist Ons Jabeur falling to the former world No. 2 in Canada.
Kinard said she doesn’t regret playing college tennis, even though she said she received up to 48 NCAA collegiate athletic scholarship offers before deciding to turn pro.
There were three players in the women’s draw competing Friday who weren’t even born before Kinard played her first pro event in May of 2006 in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta, including 14-year-old Brooke Kwon, Alyssa Ahn and Alanis Hamilton, both 17.
In the other semifinal, former Gaucho Amelie Honer will take on high school senior Hamilton from Bentonville, Ark. Hamilton has verbally committed to the University of North Carolina for the 2025-26 school year.
Honer had her hands full with Kwon from Diamond Bar holding on for a, 7-5, 4-6, 6-1, quarterfinal victory.
Like Redlands’ Kiss, Kwon was playing in her fifth match in five days as a wild card qualifier and both her and Kiss won their first WTA ranking points on Wednesday with first-round main-draw wins.
“In my mind I was thinking there’s really nothing to lose,” said Kwon, who turns 15 next week. “She was really good and she gave me a hard time but it was really fun playing against her.”
Kwon made it to the quarterfinals last month playing up in the 18s at the USTA SoCal Junior Sectionals. She is currently training at the IN Tennis Academy with her coach Ian de Guzman and also works with Tustin’s J.C. Beeson at Veylix Tennis and with the USTA national coaches in Carson.
Hamilton faced a tough Alyssa Ahn in one of the closest matches of the day that went the distance against fellow 17-year-old and high school senior Ahn from San Diego as she recorded a 6-0, 6-7 (4), 7-6 (6) win.
A third women’s player receiving their first WTA ranking point with an assist from the USTA Southern California section this week was Gianna Oboniye, 18, who was born in American, but spent her formative years training in Canada before returning to the States and ending up at the Southern California Tennis Academy two years ago being coached by Mitch Bridge and his son Jordan Bridge.
“I heard California was the place to be so I made the move,” said Oboniye, a Huntington Beach resident who made the finals in the 18s at the recent USTA SoCal Junior Sectionals to earn her wild card. “They told me the weather was amazing here and there were tournaments every week.” Oboniye is headed to Mississippi State in the fall.
The top-seeded Tien has been the Carlos Alcaraz of the SoCal Pro Series this summer and continued his dominance and winning ways taking out Quan of Thousand Oaks in two high-level sets, 6-4, 7-6 (4).
All four men’s semifinalists have ties to either USC or UCLA. On Saturday at 10 a.m., former Trojan Tien will face No. 3 seeded former Bruin All-American Keegan Smith. In other the semifinal to follow, last week’s Lakewood singles champion Govind Nanda will take on NorCal native Karl Lee. Nanda narrowly escaped defeat saving two match points against Fullerton’s Kyle Kang, 4-6, 7-6 (2), 7-6 (7). In the third set, Kang was serving for the match up 5-4 but couldn’t convert. In the third-set breaker, Kang once again served for it leading 6-5 but Nanda held on to close out the win, 9-7.
Nanda played his college tennis at UCLA while Lee, from Sacramento, played one year for UCLA before transferring to play the 2022-23 season with USC.
In the women’s doubles final on Saturday, the No. 3 seeded team of Honer and Teja Tirunelveli from Texas (by way of India) will face unseeded recent Auburn graduate Carolyn Ansari and N.C. State sophomore Gabriella Broadfoot from South Africa. In the men’s doubles final, the No. 1 seeded team of Keegan Smith and Nathan Ponwith (Georgia/Arizona) will look to repeat the title they won last week as they take on Alan Fernando Rubio Fierros of Mexico and Adam Jones from Great Britan, the No. 2 seeds.
For complete men’s and women’s draws and results and order of play, check the tournament home page here.
