TENNIS / DANA HADDAD : With Big Guns Out of the Country, Area Juniors Move Up in Sectional

The bullies have taken their tennis to faraway lands this week. Now maybe somebody else will get a chance.

Several of the area’s top players, particularly in the 16-and-under division, will miss the Southern California Sectional championships at the Los Caballeros Sports Village in Fountain Valley this week because they are competing for the U.S. Junior National team in international events.

One of the chief benefactors is Dylan Mann of Canoga Park. Southern California’s top four ranked players in the division--Kevin Kim of Fullerton, Bob and Mike Bryan of Camarillo and Geoff Abrams of Newport Beach--are competing this week in France, so Mann has moved up from seventh to third.

In girls’ 16 singles, Jessica Kessler of Studio City and Kirsten Gross of Calabasas jump up the ladder because No. 1 Erin Boisclair of Agoura and No. 4 Sophia Managadze of Glendale are out of the country.

Kessler and Gross each advance two spots to fifth and seventh in the seedings, but the maneuvering means little to Kessler.

“If I’m at the mental level I should be, it really wouldn’t matter if Erin was in town or Sophie was in town,” Kessler said. “I mentally have to be at a certain level.”

Gross, however, said the absence of Boisclair, who is in France with the national team, and Managadze, playing for her native Georgia in the former Soviet Union, will make a difference.

“I definitely think there’s an opportunity,” she said. “I know the people and I know their game. It would be a chance for a good win.”

That’s an understatement. A victory in the sectional--the most important juniors tournament of the year in Southern California--would probably bring a top-10 seeding in the girls’ 16s national tournament in San Diego in July. There are 17 sections in the country, and the Southern California section is among the strongest.

Gross admits she would prefer avoiding Boisclair and Managadze. She has not beaten either.

“Erin being gone really helps,” she said. “She’s my friend, but I’m glad she’s gone. And I told her that.”

Opportunity also knocks for Derek Pope of Ojai and former Harvard-Westlake player Philip Tseng in boys’ 18s. Second-seeded Carlos Sarmiento, a Newport Beach resident, cannot enter the sectional because of citizenship problems.

Pope is now seeded second behind Jakub Pietrowski of Huntington Beach, his doubles partner. Tseng is third.

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Finals after finals? Most area players will postpone their celebrations if they win at the sectional, because they are missing school tests that they must take next week.

Gross, who carries a 3.8 grade-point average at Calabasas High, missed her European history exam Wednesday.

“But my teacher’s pretty cool,” she said. “He’s not going to make me take it.”

Final exams in Spanish and math at Beverly Hills High await Kessler, who took a biology test seven days early last week because of the tournament.

“I have no idea how I did,” she said. “I definitely could have used an extra week.”

Jim Hillman, the tournament director, said approximately 10% of all participants in the sectional were still in school earlier this week. To try to minimize conflicts, he scheduled 900 matches in last weekend’s qualifying for the main draw that started Wednesday.

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Pichardo wins: Rita Maria Pichardo captured the women’s open championship of the first tournament she entered since defecting from Cuba on June 12. Pichardo, 24, defeated University of San Diego’s Dina Birch, 6-4, 3-6, 6-2, at Fallbrook Tennis Club.

Pichardo, now living in Glendale, was the No. 1 women’s player in Cuba. She was playing a professional satellite tournament in Mexico with the Cuban National team last October when she fled the country.