SAN DIEGO, Calif., June 19, 2023 (by Steve Pratt)

Sara Daavettila missed her flight home to Indianapolis on Sunday, but for a good cause. As she has learned early in her professional tennis career, re-scheduling a flight comes quite a bit easier than winning on the ITF World Tennis Tour.

The Michigan native and 2021 University of North Carolina graduate completed her stint in the 2023 SoCal Pro Series in grand fashion this weekend at Barnes Tennis Center, winning the women’s singles and doubles portions of the $15,000 event along the ITF Tour and USTA Pro Circuit and gaining her first ITF crowns.

Daavettila (WTA ranking No. 657) entered her second ITF women’s singles final on Sunday and upheld her No. 1 seeding with a 7-6 (3), 7-5 triumph over South African qualifier Chanel Simmonds. Daavettila, 25, did not drop a set in five matches.

On Saturday, Daavettila teamed with San Diego resident and recent Santa Fe Christian graduate Katherine Hui, 18, as the top seed in doubles and won Saturday’s SoCal Pro Series title, 7-6 (4), 6-4, over University of Texas senior-to-be Malaika Rapolu and Baylor University junior-to-be Anita Sahdieva.

“I’ve had a pretty up-and-down career, just with injuries, but I feel like every tournament I’m getting better and this was just a testament to that,” Daavettila said. “This one is very special to me and I’ll never forget this one.”

If there is any place she’d rather stay for an extra day, it would be San Diego and Barnes Tennis Center, which she has played in USTA junior national tournaments since her high school days and considers a second home for her tennis.

“I love San Diego. I played (USTA) hardcourts here for a couple years. I love Barnes,” Daavettila said. “I have family friends here that I always enjoy coming to see. It’s a little bit the best of both worlds where I get to see some friends and be in a familiar area and I also get to compete and play tennis. So I really couldn’t ask for anything better. It felt like home this week.”

For her singles win, Daavettila earned 10 WTA world ranking points and a $2,352 winner’s prize. Simmonds received six WTA world ranking points and a $1,470 runner-up prize. In doubles, Hui and Daavettila received 10 WTA world ranking points apiece and split a $955 winner’s prize in doubles. Rapolu and Sahdieva collected six WTA world ranking points each and split a $515 cash prize.

It was the first ITF doubles championship for Hui and Daavettila. Hui plans to play the final three SoCal Pro Series tournaments in Irvine and Lakewood before heading further north to begin her collegiate tenure at Stanford in the late summer.

“It feels great. It’s really encouraging to get a title,” Hui said. “I love playing doubles with Sara. I met her last year at this tournament. It’s our first time playing so it was definitely a new experience, but I think we’ll play a lot more together.”

Added Daavettila, on her partnership with Hui: “We’ve practiced a lot at tournaments. We’re friends. She’s very positive. Always pumping me up. Always supporting me. That’s very important in doubles, knowing that your partner trusts you. We had a lot of fun. We used each other’s strengths. She was a great partner. I couldn’t have asked for a better week.”

Sunday almost capped off a fairy tale week for Simmonds, a 23-time ITF singles champion who moved from Washington to San Diego in November to join Barnes Tennis Center as an assistant tennis professional. She coached the Barnes team to the CTC Cup championship two weeks ago. She advanced through qualifying this week and was vying for her first ITF singles title since 2019.

Simmonds doesn’t train or play professionally on the ITF circuit full time anymore. Her only two ITF events this year were this week and the SoCal Pro Series opener in Rancho Santa Fe. She occasionally contemplates a competitive return to Southern California events – she won The Ojai Tournament’s Women’s Open singles title in 2022 and 2023 – when convenient and when her schedule allows.

Finished with the SoCal Pro Series this year, Simmonds’ schedule is telling her to get back to her day job on Monday – “I have summer camps starting here (at Barnes Tennis Center) tomorrow, so I’ll be right back here in a couple of hours.”

Added Simmonds: “I hadn’t played a pro event in about a year-and-a-half and I saw there were these (SoCal Pro Series events in San Diego County) coming up. I was just happy to play good and the wins were just bonuses. Very pleased that I’m still able to play at a high level and I really enjoyed the whole week. I had some really long matches, too, so physically I’m exhausted today. But I think, mentally, I was quite strong throughout the week. I definitely surprised myself.

“Coming all the way through to the finals, I had some of my students ball-kid for me. My colleagues came out and watched me, and some of my students also came out, so that was special. My family is still in South Africa, far away, so I guess the next best thing is for my colleagues and my students to support me.”

Lorenzo Claverie, who lives in Boca Raton, Fla. and is preparing to be granted U.S. citizenship later this year, won his first ITF and SoCal Pro Series men’s singles crown while playing in his first ITF final on Sunday. Claverie rallied for a 3-6, 7-5, 6-2 triumph over Jamaican Blaise Bicknell, who won an NCAA Division I team title with Florida in 2021 and finished his college tennis as a graduate student at Tennessee.

“It has been the best week I’ve ever had, for now,” Claverie said. “I came from the qualies and I played good tennis so I knew that if I imposed my game, I could do very good in the tournament.

“I started cold. When I lost the first set, I went to the bathroom and I said to myself to keep pushing. I got a break in the second set and I then started to calm a little bit, and the third set I fought more. I started hitting more of the ball and I started being more aggressive. After that, it all became clear for me and it came good.”

Bicknell, 21, and Claverie, 20, made their SoCal Pro Series main draw debuts at Barnes Tennis Center. Raised in Caracas, Venezuela, Claverie moved to Florida at 14. But he is an Italian citizen and plays his tennis under Italy’s flag because his mother is Italian.

Claverie earned 15 ATP ranking points and a winner’s prize of $2,160, while Bicknell collected eight ATP ranking points and a runner-up’s share of $1,272.

San Diego resident and Ohio State recruit Bryce Nakashima, 19, reached his second SoCal Pro Series doubles final in the three San Diego County events, after having won in Rancho Santa Fe two weeks ago. He partnered with University of Oregon player Quinn Vandecasteele this week but fell short in Saturday’s men’s doubles final as top-seeded Colin Markes and Andrew Rogers pulled out a 6-4, 6-4 victory.

The win marked the second consecutive SoCal Pro Series doubles title, and the fifth ITF doubles title overall, for Rogers – a Pepperdine University graduate student in 2021-22 and a Tennessee native – since August and his second ITF doubles title this year with Markes, who played at the University of Texas.

Rogers, 24, and Markes, 26, each received 15 ATP world ranking points and split a $930 winner’s prize. Nakashima and Vandecasteele, 20, earned eight ATP world ranking points each and split a runner-up prize of $540.

The 2023 SoCal Pro Series wrapped up its $15,000 ITF men’s and women’s tournament competition within San Diego County today. Debuting in 2022, the SoCal Pro Series gives Southern California players the chance to earn valuable ATP and WTA world ranking points.

Daily tournament admission and parking is free to the public at all SoCal Pro Series events. The SoCal Pro Series’ remaining tournament dates and locations are:

• June 19-25 – Jack Kramer Club, Rolling Hills Estates
• June 26-July 2 – Racquet Club of Irvine, Irvine
• July 3-9 – Lakewood Tennis Center, Lakewood
• July 10-16 – Lakewood Tennis Center, Lakewood

To learn more about the SoCal Pro Series, go to: https://www.ustasocal.com/proseries.