Stanford's Fawcett, Cal's Lakat to meet in NCAAs

Cal's Florian Lakat, serving in the 2015 Tiburon
(Calif.) Challenger, defeated Jordi Arconada
of Texas A&M on Thursday in the second round
of the NCAA Singles Championships.
Photo by Paul Bauman

   One man from a San Francisco Bay Area school will reach the quarterfinals of the NCAA Singles Championships.

   No. 8 seed Tom Fawcett of Stanford is scheduled to meet No. 9-16 Florian Lakat of Cal today at 7 a.m. PDT in Athens, Ga. They have split two matches this season.

   Fawcett, a 6-foot-5 (1.96-meter) junior from Winnetka, Ill., thrashed Eduardo Mena of Tennessee Tech 6-0, 6-1 in the second round on Thursday. Lakat, a senior from France, topped Jordi Arconada of Texas A&M 6-4,
6-3.
   Lakat's teammate, Andre Goransson, lost to No. 9-16 seed William Blumberg of NCAA runner-up North Carolina 7-5, 6-2. Goransson, a senior from Sweden, will begin his professional career after graduation.
   Lakat also won in the first round of doubles with Filip Bergevi. Seeded 5-8, they beat Spencer Furman and Nick Stachowiak of Duke 6-2, 6-4.
   On the women's side, No. 9-16 Karla Popovic of Cal dismissed Ingrid Gamarra Martins of South Carolina 6-0, 6-3 to reach the round of 16. Popovic, a junior from Croatia, is set to play Sara Daavettila of North Carolina today at 8:30 a.m.
   Popovic and Daavettila have met once this season. Daavettila led 5-7, 6-3, 5-2 when the Tar Heels clinched a quarterfinal victory over Cal in the ITA National Women's Team Indoor Championship in February in New Haven, Conn.
   Two other women from the Bay Area lost to players from NCAA champion Florida. Stanford's Melissa Lord fell to No. 6 seed Belinda Woolcock 6-3, 6-4, and Felicity Maltby of Texas Tech and Sunnyvale was drubbed by Anna Danilina 6-1, 6-1.
   Danilina stunned No. 2 seed and 2016 runner-up Haley Carter of North Carolina in the opening round. No. 1 Francesca Di Lorenzo of Ohio State also lost in the first round.
   In the first round of doubles, Maya Jansen and Maegan Manasse of Cal dismissed Amina Ismail and Beatriz Machado Santos of Missouri 6-2, 6-2. Jansen, a graduate student, won the NCAA doubles crown with Alabama teammate Erin Routliffe in 2014 and 2015. Manasse advanced to last year's final with Denise Starr.
   Hadley Berg and Paige Cline, South Carolina teammates from the Bay Area, defeated Jada Hart and Ena Shibahara of UCLA 6-3, 5-2, retired. Hart and Shibahara won the U.S. Open girls doubles title last September.
   Stanford's Emily Arbuthnott and Taylor Davidson fell to No. 5-8 seeds Maddie Pothoff and Routliffe of Alabama 6-1, 6-3.
   Video streaming and live scoring of the tournament are available here.