Over 70 players in jr. tennis championships

 The 2012 CNMI Junior Tennis Championships will kick off tomorrow with 75 players competing in the two-weekend event.

Week 1 of this year’s championship will feature singles games in the boys and girls U10, U12, U15, and U18 age groups, while the mini tennis (co-ed), and U13 and U18 doubles will be played on Week 2 or from May 5 to 6. Games will be played both at the American Memorial Park and Pacific Islands Club tennis courts.

Officials draws have yet to be posted as of Thursday night, but 28 games are scheduled for the opening day tomorrow, including five in the girls U10 singles. Playing in Day 1 in the girls U10 singles at 8am are Ami Tsukagoshi, Angela Jun, Anna Calvert, Asia Raulerson, Catherine Atalig, Coume Kaga, and Hana Nelson.

For the 9am games, scheduled to compete are Conatsu Kaga, Jireh Warren, Daniel Lim, and Seiya Eda, while four matches are set for 9:30am with Amy Arenovski, Alina Ishikawa, Theecel Minor, and Mikayla Lopez playing in U18 games. Boys U15’s Chris Cajigan and Eunsyu Hohn and boys U10’s Michael Ren, Steven Anh are also suiting up in the 9:30am matches.

For the 10:30am games, four players-Daniel Park, Jake Lee, Nathan Nutting, and Riko Oijima-are assigned to play at AMP.

For the 11am games, slated to play in the opening matches are boys Clayton Izuka, Rafael Jones, Rintaro Miyawaki, Carol Lee, Dylan Ackerman, Haruya Eda, Hunter Thorpe, Tommy Choi, and Seok Jun Yun.

Other players competing in Week 1 are Adele and AJ, Hudkins, Aditya Rai, Alex Park, Amami Skano, Carl Dela Cruz, Carol Lee, Christian Miller, Colin Ramsey, Emily and Michael Jones, Eugene Park, Gillian Villahomez, Grace Choi, Guo Min Park, Isabel Heras, Jeffrey Seo, Jodel Fernandez, Joshua Abragan, Julia Ishikawa, Kevin Kim, Luther Lizama, Maaya Sato, Malika Miyawaki, Maria Gregoire, Melody Johnson, Mondo Taniguchi, Negahr Rastguiy, Primo Po, Robbie Schorr, Sean Lee, Steven Goodwin, Tae Yong Kim, Thea Minor, Tony Atalig, Tony Kim, Troy Young, and Vincent Tudela.

This year’s defending champion in the girls division are Lopez (U15), Julia Ishikawa (U10), and Thea Minor (U18). Tammy Ackerman won last year’s U12 crown, but will miss this weekend’s event, as she is in Fiji for a one-year scholarship.

In the boys division, the defending champions are Alex Park (U10), Jake Lee (U15), and Rafael Jones (U18). Moris Villanueva, who is in China for a soccer tournament, took the U12 title last season.

The two-weekend tournament is the last local event that awards ranking points to junior players. At the end of the season, NMITA will compile all rankings to determine the CNMI’s representatives to the 2012 North Pacific Qualifying Tournament in Guam in June. The Top 5 players in the ranking list in the U15 and U12 age groups and Top 4 in the U18 will earn slots on the team.