{"id":204343,"date":"2015-06-16T04:10:19","date_gmt":"2015-06-15T18:10:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=204343"},"modified":"2015-06-16T04:10:19","modified_gmt":"2015-06-15T18:10:19","slug":"cnmi-jr-players-off-to-strong-start","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/cnmi-jr-players-off-to-strong-start\/","title":{"rendered":"CNMI jr. players off to strong start"},"content":{"rendered":"

The CNMI Junior Tennis Team put on a strong showing in the opening day of the ITF North Pacific Regional Championships 2015.<\/p>\n

Defending U14 singles champion and top seed Tania Tan led the Commonwealth\u2019s impressive performance in yesterday\u2019s opener as she blanked Guam\u2019s Alyssa Merletti, 6-0, 6-0, on Court 2 of the Rick Ninete Tennis Center in Hagatna.<\/p>\n

Tan is in Pool A of her division and is joined by teammate and No. 4 seed Asia Raulerson, who also took only two sets to win her opening day match against the Federated States of Micronesia\u2019s Tatiana Panuelo, 6-0, 6-1.<\/p>\n

The CNMI made it a 4-0 in the girls U14 singles, as the second-ranked Malika Miyawaki and third-seeded Mimi Sakano also prevailed in their first matches in Pool B. Miyawaki dominated FSM\u2019s Isabel Garcia, 6-1, 6-1, while Sakano also pounded Guam\u2019s Jocelyn Tenai, 6-0, 6-0.<\/p>\n

\"Vincent<\/a>
Vincent Tudela goes for a backhand return to Isabel Heras during a scrimmage last Thursday at the Pacific Islands Club tennis court. (Roselyn B. Monroyo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In other results in the girls singles, the CNMI got a 3-1 record in the U12 division. In Pool A, Conatsu Kaga and Erika Tuttle swept their respective foes with the former whipping FSM\u2019s Paris Panuelo, 6-0, 6-0, and the latter crushing another FSM bet in Chelsea Panuelo, 6-1, 6-0. Conatsu\u2019s younger sister Coume gave the Commonwealth bets their third win in the division after beating Guam\u2019s Kaia Malakooti, 6-0, 6-0. Maria Gregoire completes the CNMI girls U12 team and dropped a tough game against the No. 1-ranked Anne Skilling of FSM, 5-7, 3-6.<\/p>\n

In the girls U14 singles, Isabel Heras and Ami Tsukagoshi both took the short route to victories in Day 1. The top-ranked Heras hammered Guam\u2019s Nozomi Yamasawa, 6-1, 6-0, in Pool A, while the second-seeded Tsukagoshi outclassed FSM\u2019s Chriselda Esau, 6-2, 6-4, In Pool B.<\/p>\n

In the boys division, the debuting Seung Jin Paik had the most impressive record in Day 1, going 2-0 in Pool B of the U12 division. He got his first win over FSM\u2019s Deavyn Etscheit, 6-1, 6-2, and followed with up with an equally-notable 6-1, 6-0 triumph over Palau\u2019s Jonah Tilei Ziegler. Ji Min Woo joined Paik in Pool B and also needed only two sets to down Guam\u2019s Dakota Gibson, 6-2, 6-2.<\/p>\n

In Pool A, Rintaro Miyawaki had a split, losing first to top seed Andrew Leng of Guam, 0-6, 0-6, before bouncing back with a win against teammate and fourth-ranked Sean Lee, 6-4, 6-3. Lee went 0-2 in Day 1 as he earlier fell to FSM\u2019s Jerson Freddy, 4-6, 6-2, 10-7.<\/p>\n

In the boys U14 singles, top-ranked Robbie Schorr, Ken Song, and Vincent Tudela won their opening games. Schorr was pitted against fellow CNMI player Haruya Eda in Pool A and bagged a 6-1, 6-2 win, while Song and Tudela defeated teammate Steven Goodwin, 6-4, 6-0, and Guam\u2019s Aaron Abrams, 6-0, 6-1, respectively. Goodwin absorbed his second loss in Pool C after bowing to FSM\u2019s Sterkis Abraham, 4-6, 5-7.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The CNMI Junior Tennis Team put on a strong showing in the opening day of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":204344,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[26,478,51,1388],"class_list":["post-204343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-cnmi","tag-fsm","tag-guam","tag-vincent-tudela"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=204343"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204343\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/204344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=204343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=204343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=204343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}