CALABASAS Tennis Championships & Kaley Cuoco Hits With The Locals

Written by: Staff on 22nd March 2014

Sony Open tennis tournament on Key Biscayne, in Miami, Florida

CALABASAS Tennis Championships & Kaley Cuoco Hits With The Locals

epaselect epa04132790 Horacio Zeballos (L) of Argentina and David Goffin of Belgium warm up as the sun sets before their first round match at the Sony Open tennis tournament on Key Biscayne in Miami, Florida, USA, 19 March 2014. EPA/ERIK S. LESSER |

Life as a professional tennis player has taken Oxnard’s Daniel Nguyen to Seoul, Korea; Bangkok, Thailand, and earlier this month to Kyoto, Japan. But nothing compares to playing in your local USTA Pro Circuit Futures event, sleeping in your own bed and eating home cookin’ prepared by your mother.

That’s what Nguyen’s been doing this week at the USTA Men’s Pro Tennis Championships of Calabasas, a USTA $15,000 Pro Circuit Futures event being played at the Calabasas Tennis & Swim Center. He’s been winning, too, and on Friday advanced to the semifinals with a convincing 6-1, 6-4, over former Duke All-American Henrique Cunha.

“It’s about a 35, 40-mintue drive home, but it’s great to be at home,” said Nguyen, 23. “My go-to meal this week has been whole wheat pasta, tomato sauce and chicken and vegetables.”

The four-time NCAA team champion, who played in the shadow of Steve Johnson while at USC, will next face another Southern Californian who has been traveling the world as a pro player the last few years in Jason Jung of Torrance, Calif. The former Michigan star Jung beat 16-year-old wild-card Taylor Fritz, 6-4, 6-4 earlier in the day.

In the late match, former Thousand Oaks High School teammates and former Pac-12 rivals Marcos Giron of UCLA and Kyle McMorrow formerly of Washington squared off with Giron serving tough in a 6-2, 6-3 victory. Giron had seven aces on the night, and no double faults.

The Nguyen-Jung semifinal match will take place at 4 p.m., and will be followed by a doubles semifinal match.

Local actress Kaley Cuoco will take part in an exhibition before the night’s features singles match takes place with No. 6-seeded Mate Pavic of Croatia taking on the unseeded Giron.

Nguyen is headed back to Asia next month and will play for the first time in China. “I’ve never played in China before,” he said. “It’s going to be so different than beautiful California. It’ll be smoggy and the balls will be different.”

Last year as a freshman at Torrey Pines High School, Fritz reached the final in the Boys’ CIF division at The Ojai losing to Gage Brymer. He then led his team to the CIF-San Diego section team title and won the individuals. Still an amateur, Fritz has played ITF pro events in Costa Rica, Oklahoma, Texas and Florida and is enrolled at Laurel Springs School, an online independent study program.

“I hate not having a social life and having to leave high school,” Fritz said. “It’s something I didn’t want to do, but I felt like I had to for my tennis.”

EVENTS: A USTA Junior Team Tennis Kid’s Day with a Tennis Carnival is Saturday from 4 p.m. till 5:30 p.m., and a VIP sponsor dinner reception is later in the evening from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. The Kaley Cuoco & Friends Exhibition is Saturday evening before the singles final semifinals.

Friday’s Singles Quarterfinals Scores

WC: wild card; Q: qualifier

Mate Pavic, Croatia (6), def. Gianni Mina, France, 6-7 (4), 6-1, 6-4

Marcos Giron, U.S., def. Kyle McMorrow, U.S. (q), 6-2, 6-3

Daniel Nguyen, U.S., def. Henrique Cunha, 6-1, 6-4

Jason Jung, U.S. (3), def. Taylor Fritz, U.S. (wc), 6-4, 6-4

Friday’s Doubles Semifinal Score

Dennis Novikov/Connor Smith, U.S., def. Damon Gooch, South Africa/Roberto Marcora, Italy, 6-3, 7-5

Follow along on Twitter at http://twitter.com/calabasastennis. For more information check out the official website, calabasasprotennis.com.

Past Calabasas finalists:

Year Singles Winner Singles Runner-up

2013: Sanam Singh (IND) def. Bradley Klahn (US)

2012: Tennys Sandgren (USA) def. Daniel Kosakowski (US)

2010: Marinko Matosevic (AUS) def. Ryan Sweeting (US)

2009: Donald Young (US) def. Michael Russell (US)

2008: Vince Spadea (US) def. Sam Warburg (US)

2007: Robert Kendrick (US) def. Donald Young (US)

2006: Mark Philippoussis (AUS) def. Amer Delic (US)

2005: Brian Vahaly (US) def. Denis Gremelmayr (GER)

2004: Ivo Karlovic (CRO) def. Alex Bogomolov Jr. (US)

2003: Jerome Golmard (FRA) def. Lars Burgsmuller (GER)

2002: Michael Chang (USA) def. Cecil Mamiit (PHI)

2001: Andre Sa (BRA) def. Michael Russell (USA)

Topics: 10sballs, Calabasas, Daniel Nguyen, Kaley Cuoco, Sports, Tennis, Tennis News, Usta

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March 22, 2014 at 1:21 pm

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