THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. – Freshman Keegan Smith advanced to the semifinals of the Sherwood Collegiate Cup Saturday, defeating third-seeded Bjoern Petersen of Baylor in straight sets, 6-4, 6-1. Saturday's action also featured the first doubles action at Sherwood Country Club, where a pair of Bruin teams advanced with two wins each.
Smith and both doubles teams will look to lock up finals trips Sunday in semifinal play.
No. 108 Smith's road has featured a trio of Baylor Bears, as the San Diego native knocked off Akos Kotorman (6-4, 1-6, 6-0) and Constantin Frantzen (1-6, 6-2, 6-3) before taking down Petersen Saturday.
Fifth-seeded Evan Zhu and Austin Rapp each tallied a win on Day 1 Friday, while eighth-seeded Maxime Cressy, Connor Rapp and Connor Hance all suffered three-set setbacks in the first round. Ben Goldberg and Bryce Pereira also dropped first-round decisions. Zhu registered his win over USC's Jake DeVine, 6-1, 7-5, while Austin Rapp defeated another Trojan, Matt Smolicki (6-4, 6-2).
In additional singles matches played Saturday, Austin Rapp defeated Frantzen, 6-1, 6-4, while Cressy knocked off Stanford's Michael Genender, 6-3, 6-4.
Doubles action saw the second-seeded team of Austin Rapp and Keegan Smith defeat Stanford's pair of Eric Fomba and William Genesen, 6-1, in their first match of the day. They went on to take down Kotorman and Petersen, 6-1. Connor Hance and Connor Rapp, meanwhile, earned an upset win over the fourth-seeded team of Johannes Schretter and Roy Smith of Baylor, 6-2. In their second match of the day Saturday, they topped Trojans DeVine and Smolicki, 6-1.
While the doubles teams of Cressy-Pereira and Goldberg-Zhu dropped their first-round doubles matches, they both recovered to advance in the consolation portion of the bracket. Cressy and Pereira defeated Axel Geller and David Wilczynski of Stanford, 6-4, while Goldberg and Zhu took down another Cardinal duo, Tom Fawcett and Timothy Sah, by a 6-3 score.