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INDIAN WELLS, Calif. - Returning to the Coachella Valley for the first time since 2019, the Easter Bowl proved to be a breakthrough for the four champions of the 16s and ITF divisions, all of whom collected their first USTA gold balls in singles.

ITF Girls Singles Champion Alexis Blokhina
© Zoo Tennis

In the ITF tournament, No. 4 seed Alexis Blokhina outlasted No. 3 seed Reese Brantmeier 6-3, 4-6, 7-6(4) for her first International Tennis Federation Grade 1 title, and No. 8 seed Alex Michelsen defeated No. 2 seed Nishesh Basavareddy 6-2, 6-3 to also claim his first Grade 1 singles championship.

Blokhina, a semifinalist in the previous week's San Diego Grade 1, didn't drop a set in her first four matches, but the 17-year-old left-hander from Florida needed a third set to defeat unseeded wild card and 2021 Easter Bowl 14s champion Iva Jovic 6-1, 2-6, 6-0 to reach her first Grade 1 final. Brantmeier, who was making her first appearance in a junior tournament this year, lost no more than four games in any set in her five victories, defeating No. 2 seed Qavia Lopez 6-2, 6-4 in the semifinals.

Nerves were evident for both in the first set of the final, with Blokhina holding from 0-40 down at 2-3, then breaking Brantmeier in her next two service games.

In the second set, Brantmeier took a 4-2 lead, with her forehand - shaky in the first set - starting to click. But her first serve percentage stayed low, making for long games, if not long points, and Blokhina broke back to make it 4-all. A straight-sets victory was just two games away, but Blokhina lost her serve and Brantmeier got a rare easy hold to even the match.

Brantmeier broke to open the third set, but Blokhina stepped into the second serves she was seeing and broke right back. Up 4-2 in the third, Blokhina couldn't hold that lead, but she held at 4-all, hitting a huge backhand winner at 40-30 to take a 5-4 lead, forcing Brantmeier to hold to stay in the match.

Blokhina's speed forced Brantmeier to hit another volley which went awry at 15-30, setting up two match points. Blokhina missed a backhand long and then shanked a forehand to keep Brantmeier alive, and a relieved Brantmeier hit a huge overhead to claim the game.

"The thing that got me through it, losing those two match points, was that she could have been in the same position and I could have gotten out of them, because we're both great players and that's what I need to expect," said Blokhina, who will join the Stanford Cardinal this fall. "I thought, if you got to that position once, you can do it again, so I kept fighting, focusing on my footwork and not thinking about the scoreline."