Bellis aced out in hometown tournament
STANFORD >> Turns out CiCi Bellis won’t stick around for the finals at the Bank of the West Classic.
The 18-year-old out of Atherton was knocked out of the WTA tournament in her own backyard during Saturday’s semifinals at Taube Family Tennis Stadium, losing 6-3, 6-1 to CoCo Vandeweghe, who will also play for the doubles title.
“It’s just another building block this week — definitely a huge one for me,” said Bellis, who plans to leave Sunday for Toronto, where she will play Julia Georges of Germany in the opening round of the Rogers Cup.
“Definitely one of the best weeks of my career, so far,” she added. “I’m really happy about it, overall.”
Bellis departs with a hefty $38,575 paycheck after reaching the semifinals of a WTA Premierlevel event for the first time.
It’s also possible she will crack the top 40 in next week’s world rankings, putting her closer to a seed at the U.S. Open, which was one of her goals entering this summer.
“Hopefully the next two tournaments I play go well and that can happen,” Bellis said.
Less than 24 hours after a convincing 6-2, 6-0 victory over a two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova the night before in the quarterfinals, it quickly became evident the eighth-seeded Bellis faced a much tougher task in the sixth-seeded Vandeweghe.
“I think she really takes advantage of every short ball or every opportunity you give her, and she tries to dictate everything point, pretty much,” said Bellis, after the first meeting between the young Americans. “She has a great serve, and it was pretty on today, too. So it was definitely tough to get into the points.”
Vandeweghe, 25, recorded seven aces, including a 114 mph serve to open the second set.
“On her serve, you have to see where she’s tossing and kind of guess a little bit, just because it’s coming so fast,” said Bellis, who couldn’t return blistering back-toback serves of 117 and 116 mph to close out the match.
Bellis conceded her own serve needs to continue to improve, after she was broken five times in the 65-minute match.
But she also struggled to take control of rallies throughout the afternoon.
“I still need to a bit stronger on the rest of my body,” Bellis said. “An example today was she kind of overpowered me a lot, and I think if I was a bit bigger, a bit stronger, that would’ve helped me.”
A crowd of 1,951 during the day session watched Vandeweghe become the first player since Venus Williams in 2009 to reach both the singles and doubles finals.
Lindsay Davenport is the most recent player to sweep the titles, achieving the feat in 1999. Now it’s Vandeweghe’s turn. “I entered both, so why not?” said Vandeweghe, who felt she came out sluggish in doubles on Saturday, but credited partner Abigail Spears for stepping up in the 6-3, 6-2 triumph in the semifinals.
This is not the first time Vandeweghe will play for the singles title at the Bank of the West Classic.
In 2012, she was ranked No. 120 in the world and got knocked out as a qualifier at Stanford, yet still managed to find her way into the main draw.
“I’d never gotten a lucky loser spot, so I was ready and gungho,” Vandeweghe said. “And then match after match kept falling into place.”
She ended up losing 7-5, 6-3 in the final to Serena Williams.
Five years later, it’s another allAmerican matchup on Sunday, as Madison Keys upset top-seeded Garbine Muguruza, the reigning Wimbledon champ, in the evening semifinal 6-3, 6-2.
The first-ever meeting between Keys and Vandeweghe will be televised at 2 p.m. on ESPN2.