The 121st Ojai: What you need to know about this year's tennis celebration in Libbey Park
The 121st Ojai Tennis Tournament began Tuesday with Men’s and Women’s Open Singles qualifying rounds.
The Pacific-12 Conference and California Community College championship tournaments begin Wednesday at Libbey Park, Weil Tennis Academy and Ventura College.
The tournament, a Ventura County tradition since 1896, reaches full swing in earnest with competition at eight different venues Thursday.
International Tennis Hall of Famer Tracy Austin will return as one of the tournament’s special guests, along with 12-time Grand Slam champion Rosie Casals, former World No. 1 doubles player Rick Leach, UCLA coach Billy Martin, three-time Grand Slam champion Peggy Michel, and French Open doubles champion Pam Teeguarden.
The six guests will be honored at the tournament’s fundraising event Friday at 6 p.m. at the Ojai Valley Museum. Tickets are $150 and available at TheOjai.net.
Defending champion USC is the No. 1 seed in the Pac-12 men’s team tournament. The Trojans open Thursday at noon at Libbey Park against the winner of Wednesday’s match between No. 8 Arizona State and No. 9 Oregon.
Defending champion Stanford is the top seed in the Pac-12 women’s team tournament. The Cardinal open Thursday at noon at Weil Academy against the winner of Wednesday’s match between No. 8 Utah and No. 9 Arizona.
The California Community College Athletic Association championships return after a three-year hiatus due to the pandemic. The Dual Team state championships will be held at Ventura College on Wednesday. American River College faces Orange Coast in the women’s final at 10 a.m. American River College faces College of the Desert in the men’s final at 1 p.m.
The Ventura College men fell to Desert, 6-1, in the Southern California regional final Saturday.
The men’s and women’s singles and doubles tournaments will be held at seven different venues, including Pierpoint Racquet Club, Ventura, Buena, Oxnard and Hueneme highs, and Sunday’s finals at Libbey Park.
The Men’s and Women’s Open singles and doubles events feature an improved overall purse of $25,000, with the men’s and women’s singles champions earning $5,000.
Priyank Soni and Yui Watanabe are the top seeds in the Men’s and Women’s Open singles draws, respectively.
Sunday’s schedule of finals at Libbey Park begin at 9 a.m.
Drew Koval of Oak Park High, The Star’s reigning Boys Tennis Player of the Year, highlights the CIF boys singles draw. He’s joined in the 64-player field by Ronak Santhosh (Newbury Park), Kimi Basamakov (Westlake), Thiago Canessa (Ventura), Benjamin Wang (Foothill Tech), Eric Schmidt (Nordhoff), Aiden Mueller (Thousand Oaks), and Dylan Lin (Westlake).
The girls 18U junior singles tournament draw includes Sianna Kavrakova of Ojai, Frances English of Ventura, Yiwmen Xiang of Ojai, Taylor Levy of Camarillo, Sweden van Houten of Ojai, Katie Finerman of Ojai, Ana Schmidt of Simi Valley, and Anna English of Ventura.
The boys 16U junior singles tournament draw includes Anthony Chen of Ventura, Josiah Jenkins of Ventura, and Logan Wong of Ojai.
The girls 16U junior singles tournament draw includes Maya Branson of Ventura, Chloe Wang of Newbury Park, Iye Ejura Ester Onoja of Ojai, Alena Kolsova of Agoura Hills, and Delilah Rizvi of Newbury Park.
The boys 14U junior singles tournament draw includes Clayton Pohoski of Camarillo, Levi Jefferson of Westlake Village, James Borchard of Thousand Oaks, Jesse Tange of Camarillo, Taiki Bortolin of Ventura, Drew Railey of Camarillo, Charlie Powers of Ventura, Seth Nguyen of Camarillo, Sevin Royster of Ojai, and Christopher Kasparian of Agoura Hills.
The girls 14U junior singles tournament draw includes Sania Goregaoker of Thousand Oaks, Rania Bus of Ojai, Michelle Qi of Newbury Park, Isidora Jelici of Thousand Oaks, Kacie Colby of Camarillo, Dhiya Patel of Thousand Oaks, Emma Markarian of Westlake, Madison Lopez of Oxnard, and Soraya Bus of Ojai.
This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: What you need to know about the 121st Ojai tennis tournament
