Cal players reach NCAA quarters; Stanford star hurt

   It's starting to come together for Lynn Chi.
   The unseeded Chi, a Cal sophomore, upset eighth-seeded Jennifer Brady of UCLA 6-3, 6-2 in 90-degree (32.2 Celsius) heat today to reach the quarterfinals of the NCAA Championships in Athens, Ga.
    “From the first point of the match, (Chi) really decided to play the ball early,” Cal coach Amanda Augustus said on calbears.com. “Her goal was not to give up the baseline, and then Lynn took advantage of all the shorter balls she got and never let Jenny take control of a point.
   "Lynn’s really been hitting the ball clean all tournament long. It’s just so exciting to see her maturing as a competitor. She’s always had the shots. Now she’s in command and is able to bury those shots when necessary against a particular type of opponent. She made adjustments from the last time when she played Jenny, which was a really close match (Brady won 6-4, 7-5 in the semifinals of the Pacific-12 Conference Championships on April 26 in Ojai en route to the title)."

Cal senior Ben McLachlan moved into the quarter-
finals of the NCAA Championships in Athens, Ga.
2012 photo by Paul Bauman

   Reaching the men's quarterfinals were Cal senior Ben McLachlan and UCLA freshman Mackenzie McDonald of Piedmont in the San Francisco Bay Area.
   Stanford's Kristie Ahn, seeded third in the women's draw, retired from her third-round match with an undisclosed injury while trailing unseeded Abigail Tere-Apisah of Georgia State 6-3, 1-0. 
   Also eliminated were No. 9-16 seed Jenny Jullien of Saint Mary's and unseeded Carol Zhao of Stanford. Jullien lost to seventh-seeded Hayley Carter of North Carolina 7-5, 6-2, and Zhao, a freshman, fell to No. 9-16 seed Chanelle Van Nguyen of UCLA by the same score.
   Chi, from Weston, Fla., will face top-seeded Jamie Loeb of North Carolina on Saturday. Loeb, a freshman from Ossining, N.Y., defeated 9-16 seed Breaunna Addison of Texas 7-5, 6-4.
   McLachlan, from New Zealand, dismissed Ryan Lipman of Vanderbilt 6-3, 6-4 in a matchup of unseeded players. McLachlan will face second-seeded Marcos Giron of UCLA.
   The unseeded McDonald ousted 9-16 seed Nik Scholtz of Mississippi 1-6, 6-3, 6-4 after knocking off fourth-seeded Mitchell Frank of Virginia in the first round. McDonald will take on 9-16 Soren Hess-Olesen of Texas.
   Giron and Hess-Olesen are the only remaining men's seeds.
   Cal's Gregory Bayane and Chase Melton reached the doubles quarterfinals with a 5-7, 6-2, 7-6 (5) victory over Ian Dempster and Robbie Mudge of North Carolina State. Dempster and Mudge served for the match at 5-4 in the third set and led 4-0 in the tiebreaker.
   Bayane and Melton will meet second-seeded Mikelis Libietis and Hunter Reese of Tennessee, who downed Giron and McDonald 6-1, 6-4.
   Ahn returned to the court to play doubles with Zhao, but they lost to 5-8 seeds Monique Albuquerque and Clementina Riobueno of Miami 6-4, 7-5 in the round of 16. That ended Ahn's collegiate career.
   The 5-foot-5 (1.65-meter) Ahn, from Upper Saddle River, N.J., has been hampered with injuries since her last year of high school. Her greatest moment at Stanford came when she lifted the Cardinal to last year's NCAA title with a three-set victory at No. 2 singles in a 4-3 win over Texas A&M.