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Carol hikes ranking points
Carol Lee, seen here getting ready to serve in a local tournament, gained world ranking points from tournaments in Mexico and South Korea. (Roselyn B. Monroyo)
The CNMI’s Carol Lee earned ranking points from three ITF Juniors Circuit events to remain in the Top 200 in world.
The 16-year-old got her highest—75 points—from the Copa Mundial Campeche FMT after making it to the semifinals of the doubles event of the Grade 1 tournament held in Campeche, Mexico from Nov. 12 to 18. Lee partnered with Ukraine’s Viktoriya Petrenko and they won three matches to reach the Final Four before losing their finals bid against No. 3 seed Natsumi Kawaguchi of Japan and Adrienn Nagy of Hungary.
For her other competition in Mexico—the Mundial Juvenil Yucatan HSBC FMT held at the Club Campestre de Yucatán Calle in Merida from Nov. 19 to 25—the Commonwealth player received 20 points for prevailing in her opening singles match versus American Elvina Kalieva and advancing to the Round of 32 of the Grade A event.
Earlier in October, the many-time TSL Foundation/NMSA Female Student Athlete of the Year saw action in the 2018 Lee Duk Hee Cup Chuncheon International Junior Tennis Championships in South Korea and got 25 points in the doubles event. Lee partnered with Thailand’s Lunda Kumhom and they marched into the quarterfinals of the Grade 2 contest.
With her additional 100 points in the doubles events in Mexico and South Korea, Lee’s total is now 190 (from 135 before she left the ITF/OTF regional training facility in Fiji to compete in three countries). In singles, the 25 she got in the Mundial Juvenil Yucatan, gave her 245 ranking points. The CNMI bet now has a combined 292.5 points and is ranked No. 173 in the world as of Dec. 3.
For her record, Lee owns a 21-10 singles mark this season and 16-9 in doubles. Overall, the CNMI junior player has 90-39 career singles and 57-37 career doubles records.
Meanwhile, Lee concluded her 2018 season yesterday after competing in the Orange Bowl in Florida. Unfortunately, she lost both her singles and doubles matches in the Grade A event. American Ali Despain defeated Lee in the first round of the singles event, 7-6 (6), 6-2, while in the doubles, the Commonwealth bet and Cyprus’ Eleni Louka were beaten by Alexa Noel and Nikki Redelijk of the U.S., 6-4, 6-3.
