S.F. natives Querrey, Bellis advance to finals

Sixteen-year-old CiCi Bellis, playing in the Sacramento Challenger
last July, routed Chiara Scholl in 48 minutes to reach the final of
the $25,000 Surprise (Ariz.) Tennis Open. Photo by Paul Bauman

   San Francisco natives Sam Querrey and CiCi Bellis on Saturday reached singles finals in U.S. professional tournaments.
   The unseeded Querrey, a 28-year-old resident of Las Vegas, defeated wild card Juan Martin Del Potro of Argentina 7-5, 7-5 in a matchup of 6-foot-6 (1.98-meter) players in the Delray Beach (Fla.) Open on the ATP World Tour.
   The eighth-seeded Bellis, a 16-year-old amateur from Atherton in the San Francisco Bay Area, dismissed U.S. qualifier Chiara Scholl 6-3, 6-0 in 48 minutes in the $25,000 Surprise (Ariz.) Tennis Open.
   Del Potro, the 2009 U.S. Open and 2011 Delray Beach champion, was playing in his first tournament since last March. The 27-year-old right-hander, who has a two-handed backhand, underwent the third operation on his left wrist last June. Del Potro also had right wrist surgery in 2010.
   Del Potro, 18-year-old American Taylor Fritz and Australian Open quarterfinalist Zhang Shuai of China received wild cards into the BNP Paribas Open, March 7-20 at Indian Wells, the tournament announced this week.       
   Querrey will meet unseeded Rajeev Ram of Carmel, Ind., today at noon PST (Tennis Channel). The 6-foot-4 (1.93-meter) Ram, who will turn 32 next month, beat fourth-seeded Grigor Dimitrov of Bulgaria 6-4, 6-3.
   Querrey is 5-2 against Ram with a three-match winning streak. In their last meeting, Querrey won 6-3, 7-6 (4) in the semifinals at Los Angeles in 2012 en route to the last of his seven singles titles.
   Former Stanford All-Americans Bob and Mike Bryan, seeded first, will play unseeded Oliver Marach of Austria and Fabrice Martin of France in the doubles final (10 a.m. PST, Tennis Channel). The Bryan twins, 37, seek their third straight Delray Beach title and fifth overall.
   Scholl, 23, committed seven double faults against Bellis and won only three of 22 points (14 percent) on her second serve.  
   Bellis, who has lost only 13 games in four matches and won a set 6-0 in her last three, will face unseeded American Jamie Loeb for the first time today.
   Loeb, who turned pro last summer after winning the NCAA singles title as a sophomore at North Carolina, topped 17-year-old Sofia Kenin of Pembroke Pines, Fla., 7-5, 6-2. 
   Colleges -- Mads Engsted defeated No. 119 Michael Genender 7-6 (1), 3-6, 7-5  on Court 6 to give the visiting Cal men, ranked 18th, a 4-3 over No. 22 Stanford. The Bears are 5-1, and the Cardinal is 5-4.
  The top-ranked Cal women defeated No. 22 UCLA 5-2 in Los Angeles to improve to 8-0. The Bruins fell to 5-3.