©Colette Lewis 2026–
San Diego CA–
Latak, who said he had big leads he often squandered in his earlier wins this week, continued in that mode today, watching a 5-1 lead disappear in the first set. Unable to convert two set points with Goode serving at 3-5, 15-40, Latak quickly dropped his next service game, but broke Goode for 6-5 and converted his third opportunity to serve for the set.
Latak then went up 3-0 in the second set, but proceeded to drop the next six games, with Goode picking up his level and Latak unable to exert any pressure.
“He definitely started playing better, and I feel I kind of let him do that, gave him too much time,” said the 17-year-old from Illinois, who regularly trains with Christian Groh here in San Diego. “I also feel I rushed it a little too much, didn’t go to my towel after points. Once he won one game he just kept winning points and I wasn’t slowing down the game at all. So when the third set came, it was back to square one.”
Latak lost his seventh straight game when he was broken to open the third set, but got a break at love in the next game to pull even and broke for a 3-1 lead. He gave that break back, with Goode getting back on serve, but Latak crushed a backhand winner to break Goode again and take a 5-3 lead. Serving for the match Latak fell behind 0-40, but then hit four winners in the next five points–an overhead, a service winner, a backhand winner, closing out the match on a forehand winner, with Goode missing a backhand just wide on the other point Latak won in that streak.
“At love 40 I hit two really good serves in a row, and at 30-40 I told myself I’ve got to surprise him a little bit,” said Latak, who had beaten Goode in the second round of the Orange Bowl in December 3-6, 7-5, 6-1. “He was trying to make a lot more balls toward the end of third set, so I told myself not to go for too, but go for a little more and just see what happens on his side. Third set, even though I wasn’t playing my best, I felt like mentally I played smart enough to get out of that situation.”
Latak acknowledges that the revenge factor favors Johnson.
“One thing is for sure, I know from the start he’s just going to want it so much,” said Latak, who has warmed up with Johnson the past two days. “There’s definitely motivation for him to go out and try to do his best. Obviously, he’s playing unreal right now, he won the (USTA Pro Circuit M) 15. He’s an unbelievable player, the guy’s got skills like nobody else. So tomorrow I’ll just go out there and fight.”
Johnson had his challenges in his second meeting with Cozad in the past seven days, falling behind 5-3 in the first set before winning four straight games. Cozad had a set point serving at 5-4 40-30, with Johnson coming up with a backhand on the run that Cozad couldn’t get back in play to save it.
Johnson extended his streak of games to six, taking a 2-0 lead in the second set, but Cozad broke Johnson twice to stay close, only to lose his service game at 3-4, allowing Johnson to serve out the match.
“I started out a little slower and he started with the guns out, of course, he wanted to play better,” Johnson said of the contrast in their Tucson final, which Johnson won 6-2, 6-2. “And he definitely did. I’d say these courts suit his game a little bit better as well, they are a lot slower than last week, so he had a little bit more time to work with.”
Despite going deep in back-to-back weeks, Johnson said he is holding up well physically.
“Maybe a little bit of soreness, but I’m sure all of these players have soreness as well,” said the 16-year-old from Rancho Palos Verdes California. “I’m feeling pretty good, nothing to complain about.”
As for the upcoming rematch of the Kalamazoo final, Johnson isn’t dwelling on it.
“It’s been how long, seven months?” Johnson said. “These tournaments are just titles, every match is going to be different. Obviously, I’m going to do a few things differently than I did before. But it’s kind of hard to say, because we’ve both grown a lot, gotten a lot better. So I’ll just go out and try to figure it out, and if I can, I can, if I don’t, I don’t.”
The girls semifinals both went to three sets, but those deciding sets could not have been more different.
No. 2 seed Jordyn Hazelitt defeated unseeded Allison Wang 4-6, 7-6(4), 6-0, while No. 14 seed Avery Alexander again survived a three-hour marathon, defeating top seed and fellow Canadian Nadia Lagaev 6-4, 1-6, 7-6(2).
Alexander, who had been on the court more than three hours in her 6-7(6), 6-3, 6-3 quarterfinal win over No. 11 seed Isabelle DeLuccia Thursday, needed six set points before finally closing out the 73-minute first set. The next set was drastically shorter, with Lagaev winning it in 25 minutes.
“I knew it was going to be a fight from the first game,” said the 16-year-old, who broke Lagaev in that 16-minute game. “I knew I had to prepare to stay in every single point, just fight, because she’s a really good player and she’s not going to just give it up, go easy on you.”
The second set slipped away quickly, with Alexander giving Lagaev much of the credit for the drop in her level.
“I was focused on the wrong things,” said Alexander, who has recently begun training and traveling with Tennis Canada coaches. “I was making way too many mistakes on my backhand and she was being way more consistent than me, making a lot more first serves.”
The third set returned to the level of the first, with both players committing to long rallies despite the physical toll they were taking. After Alexander won a deuce game to take a 6-5 lead, she had two set points, but netted a backhand early in a rally on the first. On Alexander’s second match point, Lagaev came up with a forehand pass to save it and hit another forehand winner to get to game point, which she converted when Alexander hit her forehand wide.
“I definitely didn’t do what I was supposed to do on those match points,” Alexander said. “I got really tight, nervous, I couldn’t go for it, I was just trying to make the ball in, which is the wrong thing to do. So I was pretty upset with myself that I let those two go, but I just said, move on, there’s a tiebreaker coming up and you need to focus on that, not what’s in the past right now.”
Alexander took an early lead in that tiebreaker and didn’t look back, going up 5-1 with perfect execution despite the three-hour and 15-minutes of play prior to that point. Making all six of her first serves, Alexander did not give Lagaev any openings, while continuing to stay aggressive.
“She’s not going to miss, and that’s the only way you’re going to win, going for your shots,” said Alexander, who will be playing in her first ITF J300 final Saturday. “And making your first serve definitely gives you an advantage, being on the offensive side of the point, and that’s really what you need, especially against a player like her, who is really consistent and won’t just miss.”
Hazelitt’s win over Wang featured less lengthy rallies, but the first set was similar to the Lagaev-Alexander semifinal, with Wang needing five set points to take the 65-minute set.
Wang was serving at 4-3 in the second set, but couldn’t convert either of her game points in the four-deuce game and Hazelitt went on to take the tiebreaker.
“It gave me a boost of confidence and energy,” Hazelitt said of coming through to win that game. “I just tried then to get a little more determined, to get more focused, have more energy.”
Hazelitt was not thrilled with her level in the first two sets, but she saw a obvious improvement in her play in the third.
“I definitely think my shots started to get better in the third set,” said the 15-year-old from Henderson Nevada. “In the first and second sets I was just making too many errors. I think I was just minimizing my errors in the third, which made for a big impact. I think she did miss a few more than she did in the previous sets, but I was just trying to be more consistent.”
Hazelitt lost in the final of the J300 in Colombia at the end of January, her first appearance in a J300 final, which may be useful in approaching Saturday’s match.
“I think it can help me with the experience, that I’ve been there before,” said Hazelitt, who turns 16 next month. “Colombia was my first final at a J300, and I was more excited than nervous I would say, but it just didn’t work out in that one, so I hope it goes my way this time.”
Both Latak and Hazelitt already have captured titles at the North American Regional Championships this week, with Latak and partner Tanishk Konduri and Hazelitt and Emery Combs winning the doubles competition this afternoon and evening.
Latak and Konduri, the No. 2 seeds, ended the winning streak of Tucson champions and No. 1 seeds Ryan Cozad and Gavin Goode 7-5, 6-3, coming back from 4-0 down in the first set.
“I think at 4-love down, Tanishk said, just bring some energy,” Latak said. “That was the one thing we were missing and after we got that, it was so much better. We were moving better on the court, playing better, going for our shots more.”
Konduri and Latak, who reached the Orange Bowl J500 final in December, broke Cozad for a 3-1 lead in the second set, then held that lead on a deciding point in the next game. When the time came for serving out the championship, Konduri stepped up, overcoming a double fault early in the game to close it on on their first match point.
“He’s a clutch server,” Latak said. “I pride myself in serving well under pressure,” Konduri said. “I wasn’t really under too much pressure in that last service game, it was more just focusing on making serves. It was more within me than external.”
Hazelitt and partner Emery Combs, seeded No. 5, defeated No. 7 seeds Kennedy Drenser-Hagmann and Karlin Schock 6-4, 1-6, 10-7.
After going down a break to open the match, Combs and Hazelitt trailed 4-2, but began to increase the pressure with easy holds on their own serves and two straight breaks to take final four games of the set.
We definitely had to adjust our game plan,” said Combs, who won the Tucson doubles title last Saturday with Olivia Traynor. “I think we were being a little too passive. And we were missing too many returns to start off, so it really helped when we started having a higher return percentage.”
But that momentum quickly disappeared, with Drenser-Hagmann and Schock taking a 4-0 lead and closing out a 25-minute second set in dominant fashion.
“I think maybe our energy dropped a little bit in the second set, but then again, they were also playing very well in that set,” Hazelitt said. “But yeah, it was a struggle in that set for sure.”
“Our plan for the tiebreak was just to gain rhythm, be aggressive and have lots of energy,” said Combs, who made all four of her first serves in the match tiebreaker. “I think I was overthinking in the second set, in the tiebreaker I just focused more on faster arm speed, more shoulder, keeping it simple.”
With an ace to make it 8-3, Combs then handed the baton to Hazelitt at 9-4, and a good first serve, or at least one that the chair umpire didn’t see as long, delivered the championship, in their first tournament as a team.
Playing in his first M25-level event this week, Antonius reached his first pro circuit semifinal with a 6-3, 6-3 win over Aleksa Ciric(Georgia Gwinnett) of Serbia. Antonius will play fellow wild card Gianluca Brunkow(UC-Santa Barbara), who beat qualifier Daniel Kakhniuk(New Mexico) 6-4, 6-1. Brunkow had defeated top seed Daniel Milavsky(Harvard) in the second round.
In doubles, Antonius is playing with Gus Grumet, the 2024 Kalamazoo 16s champion, and they have reached the final Saturday. The wild cards will play No. 2 seeds Maximilian Homberg(Pepperdine) of Germany and Christopher Papa(San Diego Christian, Pepperdine) for the title.