Kevin Anderson (tennis)

Kevin Anderson (born 18 May 1986) is a South African tennis player.

He became the top-ranked male South African player on 10 March 2008 after making the final at the 2008 Tennis Channel Open in Las Vegas. He achieved his career-high ranking of World No. 10 on 12 October 2015. He is the first South African to be ranked in the top 10 since Wayne Ferreira was No. 10 on 5 May 1997.

On 6 February 2011, he defeated Somdev Devvarman in his hometown of Johannesburg to capture the South African Open title for his first ATP-level event title.

Anderson has represented South Africa in both Davis Cup play and in the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.

Collegiate career

Anderson played three seasons of college tennis in the United States at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He was a three-time All-American in singles and two-time All-American in doubles. During his sophomore year (2005–06), he won the national doubles championship with his partner, Ryan Rowe.

The following season (2006–07), he led the Illini team to a national runner-up finish before again reaching the national championship match in doubles with Ryan Rowe and reaching the semifinals in singles.

Victoria Azarenka

Victoria Azarenka (Belarusian: Вікторыя Фёдараўна Азаранка, Łacinka Viktoryja Fiodaraŭna Azaranka [vʲikˈtɔrɨja aˈzaranka], Russian: Викто́рия Фёдоровна Аза́ренко, Viktoriya Fyodorovna Azarenko; born 31 July 1989) is a Belarusian professional tennis player. She is a former world No. 1 and is currently world No. 14 as of 1 February 2016.

She has won two Australian Open singles titles (2012 and 2013), becoming the only Belarusian player, male or female, to win a Grand Slam singles title.

Her other achievements include winning the bronze medal at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, two mixed doubles Grand Slam titles—the 2007 US Open with Max Mirnyi, the 2008 French Open with Bob Bryan—and the gold medal in the mixed doubles at the 2012 Summer Olympics with Max Mirnyi.

Personal life

On July 31, 1989, Azarenka was born in Minsk, Byelorussian SSR, Soviet Union to Alla and Fedor Azarenka in a middle-class family. She has an elder brother Max.

Azarenka's tennis idol is German legendary Steffi Graf. In an interview, Azarenka stated: "Graf's Calendar Golden Slam in 1988 is my biggest motivation."

Marcos Baghdatis

Marcos Baghdatis (Greek: Μάρκος Παγδατής, [ˈmarkos paɣðaˈtis]; born 17 June 1985) is a Cypriot professional tennis player. He was the runner-up at the 2006 Australian Open and a semifinalist at the 2006 Wimbledon Championships and reached a career-high ATP singles ranking of World No. 8 in August 2006.

Personal life

Baghdatis was born in Paramytha, Cyprus to a Lebanese father, Christos and a Greek Cypriot mother, Andoula. He has two brothers, Petros and Marinos and a sister, Zena, who was adopted by his family at just 6 months old. His father, a native Lebanese who follows Greek Orthodox Christianity emigrated to Cyprus from Lebanon and owns a clothes shop. He began playing tennis at the age of five with his father and brothers. He enjoys playing and watching football and is a supporter of Apollon Limassol in Cyprus. He trained at the Mouratoglou Tennis Academy in Paris on an Olympic Solidarity Youth Development Programme Scholarship since the age of 13 and learned to speak French.

U.S. Open

The term U.S. Open or US Open is applied to "open" United States-hosted championships in a particular sport (or non-sport organized competitive gaming activity), in which anyone, amateur or professional, American or non-American, and generally, male or female, may compete.

The term most commonly refers to:

Other uses include (in alphabetical order by sport/game):

U.S. Open (bowling)

The U.S. Open is one of the four major tournaments in the Professional Bowlers Association. The first modern-day U.S. Open tournament in the PBA took place in 1971 and was won by Mike Limongello. Prior to 1971, this event was known as the BPAA All-Star. BPAA All-Star winners in the PBA era (1959-1970) were initially not credited with PBA titles for their victories. A rule change in 2008, however, retroactively awarded titles to the winners if they were PBA members at the time of their victories. With five wins, Pete Weber holds the most U.S. Open trophies of all time.

In recent years, the U.S. Open winner earned $50,000 and automatic entry into the match play round at the PBA Tournament of Champions.

Unable to find viable sponsorship, the U.S. Open was canceled for 2014, amid speculation that the tournament may not return at all. However, the USBC and BPAA later reached a three-year agreement that will bring the tournament back for 2015, 2016 and 2017. The USBC and BPAA have secured Bowlmor AMF, the largest operator of bowling centers in the world, as the title sponsor for 2015. The 2015 tournament took place November 2–8 in Garland, Texas.

United States Open (crosswords)

The United States Open was a crossword puzzle-solving tournament that lasted from 1982 to 1986. Sponsored by Games Magazine and directed by Will Shortz, it attracted thousands of potential competitors and was, along with the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament, one of the two largest crossword tournaments in recent decades.

A qualifying puzzle ran in Games Magazine. Solvers of the puzzle could decide whether they wanted to be Nonparticipants or Participants. Nonparticipants with correct solutions were eligible for a random drawing, the winner of which would receive a cash prize. Participants with correct solutions were mailed four very difficult tiebreaker crosswords, many of which had deliberately tricky crossings and unannounced gimmicks (for example, the long entries in a puzzle might reveal that all of the across clues were in reverse order). The 250 solvers with the best scores on the tiebreak puzzles were invited to New York City to participate in the tournament.

Nicolás Almagro

Nicolás Almagro Sánchez (Spanish pronunciation: [nikoˈlas alˈmaɣɾo ˈsantʃeθ]; born 21 August 1985 in Murcia, Spain) is a Spanish professional tennis player, ranked world no. 74 on the ATP World Tour. He reached the quarterfinals of the French Open in 2008, 2010 and 2012 (losing each time to Rafael Nadal, the eventual champion), as well as the quarterfinals of the Australian Open in 2013 (losing to David Ferrer after leading by two sets to love). Almagro has won 12 singles titles and he achieved his career-high singles ranking of World No. 9 in May 2011.

Career

Juniors

Almagro reached as high as World No. 18 in the junior singles rankings in December 2003.

2005

Almagro won the gold medal at the 2005 Mediterranean Games by defeating compatriot Guillermo García-López in the final in Almería, Spain.

2006

In April 2006, Almagro won his maiden ATP tournament title, the Open de Tenis Comunidad Valenciana (Valencia, Spain). Almagro was forced to come through the qualification rounds just to make this event, but that did not stop him from winning eight matches in a row, including three-set victories over former world no. 1s Juan Carlos Ferrero and Marat Safin.