For Immediate Release Contact: Ben Kelly, ITA ([email protected], 609-497-6921) September 26, 2014

2014 Riviera/ITA Women’s All-American Championships set to begin Saturday Action kicks off with Pre-qualifying Singles and Doubles, hosted by UCLA

PQ Singles Draw PQ Doubles Draw

SKILLMAN, NJ (Sept. 26) - The Riviera Club in Pacific Palisades, CA, will serve as host for the 31st Riviera/ITA Women’s All-American Championships. The national championship begins Saturday, Sept. 27, with pre-qualifying singles and doubles matches hosted by UCLA. Main draw action is slated for Thursday, Oct. 2-Sunday, Oct. 5 at the Riviera Tennis Club.

Pre-qualifying rounds comprise a singles draw of 64 players and a doubles draw of 32 players. Each player or doubles pair must win three rounds to advance to the qualifying draw; a total of eight singles players and four doubles teams move on from pre-qualifying to qualifying.

The qualifying rounds are also comprised of a singles draw of 64 and a doubles draw of 32. Just as with pre-qualifying, a singles player or doubles tandem must win three consecutive matches to advance into the main draw. Eight spots in the main draw are reserved for singles qualifiers, while the doubles main draw imports four teams from qualifying.

Main draw singles semifinalists, main draw doubles finalists and main draw consolation champions will receive automatic entry into the USTA/ITA National Indoor Intercollegiate Championships, Nov. 6-9 at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing, New York.

The 2014 singles field is exceptionally strong. The 2013 champion, sophomore Jamie Loeb of North Carolina, is back, as are two former finalists: senior of UCLA, who was Loeb’s counterpart in the 2013 final, and junior Julia Elbaba of Virginia, who reached the final in 2012. Loeb and Anderson are ranked first and second in the 2014 ITA Division I Women’s Preseason Singles Rankings, while Elbaba is not far behind, ranking fifth.

Elbaba advanced to the title match as a freshman in 2012, where she fell in three sets to of Florida. Last year as a sophomore Elbaba reached the main draw Round of 32.

Accompanying the hardware-wielding trio above in the Top 5 is a second Carolina Tar Heel, sophomore , who is ranked third in the 2014 Division I Preseason Women’s Singles Rankings.

In addition to four of the preseason top five singles players competing in the tournament, the Riviera/ITA singles field includes a total of seventeen returning ITA All-Americans.

As ITA All-Americans in both singles and doubles, Carter and Loeb are doubling down as a pair in the doubles draw. The high-powered duo is ranked second in the 2014 ITA Division I Women’s Preseason Doubles Rankings. Claiming the top spot ahead of them is Alabama’s sophomore- junior combo of and Maya Janssen, who ended the 2013-2014 season winning ten consecutive matches en route to the NCAA Doubles Championship. Another exceptional draw, the Riviera/ITA doubles field features the top four preseason pairs in the country and eight of the top ten.

Several former Riviera/ITA Women’s All-American Championships winners have forged successful careers at the professional level, including from Florida, who retired at age 39 and reached the WTA top 40 in 2006; Raquel Kops-Jones of California, who is currently the 11th ranked doubles player on the WTA Tour; and Irina Falconi of Georgia Tech, who cracked the WTA top 100 singles rankings up to 73rd after advancing to the third round of the 2011 US Open. Most recently, , a 2011 Riviera doubles champion from Stanford, reached the third round of this year’s US Open in singles. She is currently ranked No. 92 in the WTA world rankings.

Follow the ITA on Twitter, @ITAtennis, for updates and news from Pacific Palisades or search for the hashtag #RivieraITA to find other tweets from those tweeting the events from the Riviera/ITA Women’s All-American Championships. Check out the ITA Facebook page or the 2014 All- American Championships webpage for more updates.

About the Riviera/ITA Women’s All-American Championships The ITA Women’s All-American Championships were first inaugurated in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina and have been hosted by the Riviera Tennis Club in Pacific Palisades, California, since 1986. Now, thirty-one years since the inaugural tournament, the Riviera/ITA Women’s All- American Championships continue to bring together the finest returning singles and doubles competitors from the previous season with the cream of the crop of the incoming freshman class for a fantastic week of tennis.

About the ITA As the governing body of collegiate tennis, the ITA promotes both the athletic and academic achievements of the collegiate tennis community. The ITA, which is comprised of nearly 1,700 men's and women's varsity coaches representing over 1,200 institutions, administers numerous regional and national championships and the ITA College Tennis Rankings for over 20,000 college varsity student-athletes at NCAA Divisions I, II and III, NAIA and Junior College levels. The ITA also has a comprehensive awards program for players and coaches to honor excellence in academics, leadership and sportsmanship. The official ITA website is www.itatennis.com.