Evans wins first title in third major final

In the third major junior singles final for Tatum Evans in a year, the Virginia teen prevailed for the first time in the USTA Billie Jean King Girls 16s National Championships.

The second-seeded Evans, of McLean, Va., took early control and then recovered from a second-set downturn to take the last five games for a 6-1, 7-5 victory over Luciana Perry, of Export, Pa., at the Barnes Tennis Center on Wednesday.

The title, which provides a wild-card entry in the U.S. Juniors Open, came after Evans had the runner-up role in the Orange Bowl and Easter Bowl tournaments.

“It was actually a good thing that I wasn’t able to pull those out,” said Evans, a prep sophomore-to-be, who exhibited a strong backhand. “If I won, I would not have thought about the match. But I had to study why I lost. So I went into this one knowing what to do more and how to act.”

It helped, too, that Evans received a pep talk before the tourney from her father, Patrick, a former football player at Rice University.

“In football, you’re ramming into guys, but it’s also such a mental sport,” the younger Evans said. “He has a lot of experience with that. He has no idea what’s happening on the tennis court, but he knows what’s happening in my mind.”

In the second set, Evans had to reassess her game after the 33th-seeded Perry won four straight games to a take a 5-2 edge.

“She played great and started to get in rhythm,” Evans said. “But I got into my head, and I was overthinking. That’s happened in my other tennis matches. I’m glad that I was able to recognize it and snap out of it.”

Evans also drew from her semifinal match on Tuesday, when she overcame five match points to outlast No. 8 Alexia Harmon of Las Vegas, 3-6, 6-4, 7-6 (4) in a match lasting 3 hours, 38 minutes.

“So, if I could survive five match points then,” Evans said, “I knew I could come back.”

The 5-foot-10½ Evans has emerged on the national stage after switching coaches and doing extra training while the pandemic largely curtailed tourney play last year.

Perry, ranked as high as seventh nationally into the year, lost her first five service games before winning two straight as part of her second-set comeback.

“I was going point by point, not thinking ahead,” said the 5-4 Perry, whose hometown is near Pittsburgh. “But the she came back, playing more aggressively and definitely raising her energy. At 5-5, I just couldn’t match that level.”

Perry also came off a three-set semifinal victory. She topped No. 11 Arina Oreshchenkova, of Rockaway Beach, N.Y., 6-3, 5-7, 6-4.

Among local players, Fallbrook’s Emily Deming, San Diego’s Alyssa Ahn and San Diego’s Elena Zhao each reached the Round of 64 in the 256-player field.

The 18s singles final is slated for noon Sunday.

Thien is a freelance writer.