Public invited to the 8th Annual Battle in the Bay Classic

The women’s draw includes 16 players from USF, University of Arizona, University of the Pacific and UC Santa Barbara. The men’s draw will feature over 32 players from USF, USC, Cal, Stanford, Pepperdine, University of San Diego, Cal Poly, University of Iowa, Texas Christian University, University of the Pacific, UC Davis, UC Santa Barbara and San Diego State University.

“We have a really nice format and you can get up close to all of the matches -- you are literally right on the court with the coaches and the players,” said Pablo Pires de Almeida, USF’s Head Men's Tennis Coach and organizer of the tournament.

Play kicks off on the afternoon of Thursday, September 22 with women’s singles (exact start time TBD). On Saturday night is an exhibition match and on Sunday are semi-finals and finals, as well as Kids Day, hosted by Harper for Kids. See additional schedule details below.

The winner of the tournament on the women’s side gets a wildcard to the Stockton Challenger professional tournament next summer. The winner on the men’s side gets a wildcard to the Tiburon Challenger, which takes place the following week. Results factor into the player’s individual rankings but not their team’s (the collegiate team season takes place in the spring). Many of the players have ATP and WTA world rankings and past players have gone on to professional careers.

“Andrea Ka, who was last year’s winner and graduated from USF, has won two professional tournaments and is moving up the rankings,” said de Almeida. “On the men’s side, last year’s USF graduate and BBC exhibition winner, Bernardo Saraiva, was a finalist in four professional tournaments this summer. We just had three recent winners and participants of our tournament compete in the qualifying draw of singles and the main draw of the doubles in the US Open.”

Schedule of play

Tournament links:

• Official USF tournament page
• Tournament Facebook page
• Harper for Kids – Kids Day -- sign up