All 4 local Cincinnati Open competitors eliminated from singles tournaments as second rounds conclude
MASON, Ohio —
All four of the local participants in the Cincinnati Open have now been eliminated from their respective singles tournaments.
Cincinnati native JJ Wolf, Madeira native Caty McNally, and Mason natives Peyton Stearns and Vignesh Gogineni each suffered a loss to an opponent by the end of the day on Saturday, removing the possibility that the Cincinnati Open could be won by a hometown favorite in singles tennis this year.
Peyton Stearns (left), Vignesh Gogineni (center-left), JJ Wolf (center-right), & Caty McNally (right)
Due to the timing of his match, Gogineni (ranked 770th in men’s singles) was among the first to be eliminated among all of the professional tennis players gathered in Mason as the beginning of the tournament got underway on Tuesday morning. The 22-year-old fell to Finland’s Otto Virtanen in the Open’s qualifying round by a score of 6-3, 6-1. The match marked Gogineni’s professional debut in a tournament held by the Association of Tennis Professionals, the leading governing body for male professional tennis players around the world.
Meanwhile, Wolf (ranked 285th in the world in men’s singles) had better luck in the qualifying rounds of the tournament, going on to advance to the Round of 128 after earning wins in three sets over Japanese competitors Shintaro Mochizuki and Sho Shimabukuro. Notably, these marked the Ohio State alum’s first matches to be played in a major tennis tournament since 2024 after Wolf suffered a shoulder injury that required extensive rehabilitation time. Despite this, the comeback bid for the hometown favorite would nonetheless end on Friday after the 27-year-old fell to Australian James Duckworth in two hard-fought sets by a final score of 7-5, 7-6.
Taking to the court later in the week, both McNally (ranked 70th in the world in women’s singles) and Stearns (ranked 53rd in the world in women’s singles) maintained high enough rankings that they did not need to compete in the Open’s qualifying rounds. As a result, after an extended period of time spent at home in Cincinnati after coming back from the recent Canadian Open, both would go on to win their opening rounds in two straight sets each, with McNally defeating fellow American McCartney Kessler 6-3, 6-4 and Stearns defeating Harriet Dart of Great Britain 6-1, 7-6.
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However, after their strong start, both Greater Cincinnati natives would later lose in quick succession in back-to-back matches played in the Round of 64 on Saturday. McNally fell to Russian Anna Kalinskaya by a score of 6-3, 6-4. Meanwhile, Stearns fell to Denmark’s Clara Tauson by a score of 7-6, 1-6, 7-5.
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Despite the elimination of Greater Cincinnati’s two highest-ranked female professional tennis players, both are not done playing yet at the Lindner Family Tennis Center this week. On Monday, McNally will compete alongside fellow American Iva Jovic as they take on the Chinese duo of Tang Qianhui and Xu Yifan in the first round of the women’s doubles tournament. Meanwhile, Stearns faces an especially lofty matchup ahead of her as she plays alongside Ukrainian Marta Kostyuk to challenge two of tennis’s all-time greatest players: Serena and Venus Williams.
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The match will mark the first time that the two sisters have taken to the court together as a pair since Serena Williams unexpectedly came out of retirement earlier this summer. Neither has won a doubles title since the two won at Wimbledon together in 2016.