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The top players in the nation are slated to compete at the Riviera/ITA Women's All-American Tennis Championships October 6-9 at the legendary Riviera Tennis Club in Pacific Palisades, Calif.
The 32-player and 16-doubles team fields for the first of three national collegiate tennis championships to be played during this 2005-06 collegiate tennis season were announced today by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association. The men's counterpart to this event, the Polo Ralph Lauren All-American Championships, will be taking place at the same time in Tulsa. These events kick off the national calendar for the college season. The second national event is the ITA National Intercollegiate Indoor Championship hosted by Ohio State in November and the third event (not administered by the ITA) is the NCAA Championship hosted by Stanford in May.
This year's singles championship will be highlighted by 39 of the top 40 players in the ITA's preseason national singles rankings. Top-ranked Jennifer Magley highlights the main draw. Joining her are nine players from the top 10 (in order): Susie Babos of California, Nicole Leimbach of TCU, Robin Stephenson of Alabama, Daniela Bercek of Duke, Shadisha Robinson of Georgia, Kristi Miller of Georgia Tech, Lindsey Nelson of Southern California and Alice Barnes of Stanford. Also competing will be 2004 finalist Cristelle Grier of Northwestern.
Top-ranked Shadisha Robinson and Caroline Basu of Georgia highlight the doubles draw. Also on hand will be No. 2 Catrina and Christian Thompson of Notre Dame, who reached last year's final.
The Riviera/ITA All-American Championships include 64-player and 32-doubles team qualifying tournaments October 4-5, which feed into the main draw. A 64-player, 32-team prequalifying tournament takes place at UCLA Oct. 1-2.
The Riviera/ITA Women's All-American Championships date back to 1983 when Georgia's Lisa Spain won the inaugural title. In 1999 the University of San Diego's Zuzana Lesenarova made history at the Riviera when she won her record fifth national collegiate singles title. In 2003 California's Raquel Kops-Jones become the first African American woman to win a national collegiate singles title at the NCAA Division I level. Northwestern freshman Audra Cohen captured the 2004 singles title and Florida freshmen Whitney Benik and Lolita Frangulyan took home the doubles crown.
Stanford boasts the most singles and doubles champions at this event with a total of eight, and Texas is not far behind with six.
