SAN DIEGO, April 11, 2024 (by Steve Pratt)

The USTA Southern California Section has announced seven consecutive weeks of men’s and women’s professional tennis tournaments at facilities in San Diego and Los Angeles counties. The $15,000-purse events for both men and women are part of the USTA Pro Circuit and ITF World Tennis Tour.

Set to play over the spring and summer for the third consecutive year, the SoCal Pro Series will once again give Southern California players the chance to earn valuable ATP and WTA points as they make their way up the world rankings ladder and, thus, earn opportunities to play in elevated pro tournaments on the USTA Pro Circuit with a view towards ATP and WTA Tour competition.

Wild cards will be available to U.S. citizens who are Southern California residents or full-time students at a Southern California college.

The SoCal Pro Series’ upcoming seven tournament dates and locations are:

• May 27-June 2 – Barnes Tennis Center, San Diego
• June 3-9 – Barnes Tennis Center, San Diego
• June 10-16 – University of San Diego, San Diego
• June 17-23 – Rancho Santa Fe Tennis Club, Rancho Santa Fe, Calif.
• June 24-30 – Jack Kramer Club, Rolling Hills Estates, Calif.
• July 1-7 – Lakewood Tennis Center, Lakewood, Calif.
• July 8-14 – Lakewood Tennis Center, Lakewood, Calif.

“The SoCal Pro Series has become an integral part of the competitive pathway that so many of our junior and college players have taken advantage of – a true stepping stone to get to that next level and gain entry into the biggest tournaments in the world,” said Trevor Kronemann, USTA Southern California’s Executive Director. “This is the goal of the SoCal Pro Series and we are excited for the return of these seven straight weeks of play for our section’s top players.”

Among the young professionals and college players who shined in the seven-event SoCal Pro Series, USC senior Stefan Dostanic and San Diego native Haley Giavara won the “Race To Indian Wells” standings by virtue of accumulating the best combined results throughout the 2023 SoCal Pro Series and received a wild card into qualifying for the 2024 BNP Paribas Open, a Masters 1000 tournament in Indian Wells, Calif.

Aliso Viejo native Alex Michelsen might be considered the poster boy of the SoCal Pro Series program. Two summers ago, he debuted in USTA SoCal’s new pro competition in 2022 at age 17 and without a world ranking.

Since graduating from SoCal Pro Series events that year, he has gone on to reach his first ATP singles final and become the only American to compete at the Next Generation ATP Finals in 2023 and win Grand Slam singles matches at the 2023 US Open and 2024 Australian Open (he made the third round in Melbourne). He is the youngest player ranked in the world’s top 100 at No. 70.

In 2022, San Diego’s Zach Svajda (world-ranked No. 128) won back-to-back SoCal Pro Series titles, beating Brandon Holt (No. 257) in the finals at Jack Kramer Club. Just two months later, Holt went on to qualify for the US Open and beat ATP top-10 player Taylor Fritz, the world’s highest-ranked American player, for his first career Grand Slam main-draw win.

Other graduates of the SoCal Pro Series include former USTA SoCal junior standouts like Altadena’s Tristan Boyer (No. 193), Omni Kumar (No. 348), UCLA’s Tian Fangran, who won the NCAA Division I women’s singles title in 2023, and Stanford freshman Katherine Hui, a San Diego resident who just weeks after playing in the series went on to win the US Open (Junior) Girls’ singles title.

Southern California players can register to play in pre-qualifying events for a chance to earn their way into main draws of USTA SoCal tournaments as wild cards. The upcoming pre-qualifying schedule includes: Barnes Tennis Center 1, April 13-15; University of San Diego, May 10-13; Lakewood Tennis Center 1, May 18-22; Barnes Tennis Center 2, May 25-27; Rancho Santa Fe Tennis Club, May 31-June 2; Jack Kramer Club, June 14-16.

To learn more about the SoCal Pro Series, click here.