Northern California’s Jessup Breaks Up Eastern Connection in Boys’ 12s Semifinals

In an event dominated by East Coast bloodlines, Michael Jessup is an outsider.

Jessup, of Saratoga near San Jose, is the remaining Western representative in the boys’ 12-and-under national championship tennis tournament at Morley Field.

In Friday’s quarterfinals, Jessup handily defeated top-seeded Scott Humphries of Greeley, Colo., 6-1, 6-2, to reach today’s semifinals.

Jessup’s company today will include two players from Massachusetts and one from Florida, all seeded.

“I didn’t really expect to win,” Jessup said.

The last time these two met, Humphries defeated Jessup, 6-0, 6-1, at a tournament in Santa Rosa, so Jessup was dealing with butterflies at the start of the match.

“At first I was a little nervous,” he said, “but then I took a 3-love lead,” which seemed to have quite a calming effect,

Humphries, who had lost only eight games in the tournament, took a brief 2-1 lead in the second set, but Jessup, a left-hander, was in control for the remainder.

Jessup said that to upset the recent winner of the 12s hardcourt championship in Corpus Christi, Tex., he mixed up his shots.

“I was just trying to play all different games,” he said. “I tried to go to his backhand and pull him in (to the net),” he said.

This is Jessup’s second national tournament. In his first, the clay courts, Jessup was eliminated in the first round but made it to the quarterfinals in the consolation draw.

He missed playing in the nationals last year because of other commitments.

“I was playing baseball,” he said.

Why, then, the sudden interest in competitive tennis?

“I started playing tennis more because I was doing well,” he said.

Jessup’s mother, Rita, said she had wanted her son to finish out his Little League baseball season but instead allowed him to devote more time to tennis, a sport she has learned about through his association.

“Michael didn’t get interested in tennis because of his parents,” Rita said. “I’ve started playing tennis because of him. But he won’t play with me.”

Jessup is the No. 3-ranked 12s player in Northern California, and his best tournament finish was winning the Northern California Tennis Assn. junior sectionals earlier this year.

Jessup said he has played well all week, especially in the past two days.

“I started playing really good this match and the match before,” he said.

And, he said, this match boosted his confidence--but not overly so.

“You just have to go out and play your game,” he said. “I just hope I win.”

Tennis Notes

B.J. Stearns of Seminole, Fla., the No. 2-seeded player, has been quite successful in the 12s this year and can win his second national tournament of 1988 if he wins here. He won the national clay courts July 30 in Winston-Salem, N.C., finished sixth at the hardcourts two weeks earlier and, with Scott Humphries, won the doubles draw of both surface championships. Stearns defeated Paul Goldstein of Rockville, Md., 6-1, 6-4, in the quarterfinals. Goldstein pressed Stearns in the second set when, with Stearns up, 5-1, Goldstein won three consecutive games. But Stearns broke Goldstein’s serve to go up, 5-4, and served out the match for the victory. Stearns meets Joshua Hausman of Waban, Mass., the No. 6-seeded player, in the first semifinal today at 10:30 a.m. Hausman stopped St. Louis’ Bill Gluck, 6-1, 6-1. Hausman hasn’t dropped a set and has lost only six games in five matches of the tournament. . . . Ry Tarpley of Wilton, Mass., the No. 4-seeded player, was a winner over Marcus Fluitt of Miami, 6-2, 6-3. Tarpley meets Michael Jessup today at 12 p.m.