Home Depot Center News

Sloane Stephens, Alison Riske, Nicole Gibbs and Kristie Ahn receive wildcards into LA Women's Tennis Championships qualifying this Saturday at The Home Depot Center

CARSON, CA (Thursday, July 30, 2009) - Southern California residents, Vania King and Coco Vandeweghe, and Portuguese 16-year-old Michelle Larcher de Brito have been awarded wildcard entries into the main draw at the 2009 LA Women's Tennis Championships presented by Herbalife, Aug. 3-9 on the hard courts of The Home Depot Center on the campus of California State University, Dominguez Hills.

King, born in Monterey Park and residing in Long Beach, will be playing in her fourth consecutive LA Women's Tennis Championships. Vandeweghe, a 17-year-old Rancho Santa Fe resident, made her LA Women's Tennis Championships debut in 2008 as a wildcard. Larcher de Brito will be making her main draw debut in the LA Women's Tennis Championships.

One of Southern California's most prestigious tennis traditions, the $700,000 LA Women's Tennis Championships enables tennis fans to enjoy a world-class, 56-player singles draw that will include World No. 1 and defending champion Dinara Safina, former World No. 1, three-time Grand Slam and 19-time WTA Tour singles champion, and Manhattan Beach resident Maria Sharapova.

Rounding out the top-15 players in the Carson draw are Russia's Vera Zvonareva (ranked No. 7 in the world), Denmark's Caroline Wozniacki (No. 9), Nadia Petrova (No. 10), Belarus' Victoria Azarenka (No. 8), , Serbia's Ana Ivanovic (No. 11), the event's 2007 champion, Slovakia's Dominika Cibulkova (No. 12), Poland's Agnieszka Radwanska (No. 13), France's Marion Bartoli (No. 14), and Italy's Flavia Pennetta (No. 15). The tournament also features a 16-team doubles draw.

The LA Women's Tennis Championships also dealt wildcard entries for tournament qualifying to four Americans - 16-year-olds Sloane Stephens and Nicole Gibbs, 17-year-old Kristie Ahn and 19-year-old Alison Riske. Qualifying takes place Saturday (10:30 a.m. start) and Sunday (11 a.m. start) at The Home Depot Center.

King is a 20-year-old Taiwanese-American who is ranked No. 128 in singles and No. 25 in doubles. She has one Sony Ericsson WTA Tour singles title to her credit, at Bangkok in 2006, and logged her best singles result this year by reaching the quarterfinals in Monterrey. She won the latest of her seven Tour doubles titles this year in Brisbane, and followed that up with a run to the French Open final in mixed doubles. She turned professional in July 2006 and was a member of the U.S. Fed Cup team from 2006-08.

King warmed up for the LA Women's Tennis Championships this month by collecting World TeamTennis (WTT) Female MVP honors while leading the Springfield Lasers to the WTT championship match. She will also be warming up her voice to sing the national anthem at Dodger Stadium on Monday evening, August 3, before the Los Angeles Dodgers play the Milwaukee Brewers. At the 2006 U.S. Open, King sang \"America the Beautiful\" before the Arthur Ashe Stadium crowd.

Larcher de Brito, ranked No. 91 on the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour in singles, is an up-and-coming product of the IMG Bollettieri Academy in Bradenton, Fla. She reached the third round of the 2009 French Open as a qualifier in her Grand Slam main draw debut, and advanced to the second round at Wimbledon. She turned pro in February 2007 and achieved her best WTA Tour singles result in 2008 as a quarterfinalist at Tashkent.

Vandeweghe won the 2008 U.S. Open Junior singles championship. In October 2008, she advanced to the semifinals of the ITF singles event in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. She is the niece of former UCLA and NBA standout Kiki Vandeweghe and grand daughter of Ernie Vandeweghe, who played for the New York Knicks in the 1950s.

As for the wildcard qualifiers, Stephens won the Junior ITF Spring Internationals at The Home Depot Center in April. Ahn, still a Junior player, owns three USTA Pro Circuit Futures singles titles, one of which was the first pro tournament she played in - Landisville, Pa. in 2008. Riske had WTA Tour main draw appearances this year at Ponte Vedra Beach and Charleston, won her first ITF title (in doubles) and reached the singles final at Hilton Head Island in June, and participated in U.S. Open qualifying in 2007.

Gibbs is a Junior who plays out of the USTA Training Center - West at The Home Depot Center and lives in Manhattan Beach. Gibbs advanced to the quarterfinals of the USTA Pro Circuit Challenger event at The Home Depot Center in May after beating top-seeded Lindsay Lee-Waters and Asia Muhammad. In consecutive weeks in April, Gibbs reached the Easter Bowl quarterfinals and lost to Stephens in the semifinals at the Junior ITF Spring Internationals.

Tournament Tickets & Daily Promotions
Individual tickets are on sale now, starting at just $25. The tournament is also offering a special \"Buy One, Get One Free All-Week Pass,\" which includes tickets to all 13 sessions of play. Throughout the week, fans can enjoy daily promotions and events, including:

• Monday: Happy Hour Monday specials, plus a VIP \"Meet the Players\" Party with purchase of all-session pass
• Tuesday: $2 Taco Tuesday specials and \"Women in Sports Night\" featuring players from the Los Angeles Sparks (WNBA) and Los Angeles Sol (WPS), plus a career fair
• Wednesday: Help your non-profit benefit from money raised through tournament ticket sales and silent auction with \"Tennis Cares Night\"
• Thursday: USTA Member Appreciation Night discounts
• Friday: Mini-Fan and Keychain giveaway
• Saturday: Semifinals and Fireworks Celebration under the stars
• Sunday: Finals and Dunlop hat giveaway

More details on the tournament's week of promotions are listed at www.latennischamps.com. To take advantage of the benefits, ticket discounts, promotions and specials in the best seat locations for all sessions, call 1-877-AEG-TICKETS (1-877-234-8425) or visit www.latennischamps.com. Event Suites are also available at a special rate by calling 1-877-604-8777. Tickets are also available for purchase at The Home Depot Center Box Office (open Monday-Friday, 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. and on event days) and all Ticketmaster outlets, including www.Ticketmaster.com.

About the Tournament

The LA Women's Tennis Championships presented by Herbalife, in its 39th year, is one of the most historic events in women's tennis and is being held for the sixth consecutive year at The Home Depot Center. The Sony Ericsson WTA Tour Premier event offers prize money of $700,000 to the 56-player singles and 16-team doubles draws. The distinguished tournament champions list includes Dinara Safina, Kim Clijsters, Serena Williams, Lindsay Davenport, Monica Seles, Steffi Graf, Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova and Billie Jean King, all of whom have also been ranked No. 1 on the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour during their careers.

The LA Women's Tennis Championships presented by Herbalife is part of the prestigious Olympus US Open Series, which links nine summer hard-court tournaments to the famed U.S. Open. This year's tournament marks the sixth year players competing in the U.S. Open Series tournaments will be vying for bonus prize money at the U.S. Open. Players competing in the \"summer season\" of tennis at the participating Sony Ericsson WTA Tour tournaments will receive Olympus U.S. Open Series points, which will ultimately earn the series winner the opportunity to double her U.S. Open prize purse.

About The Home Depot Center

The Home Depot Center is southern California's home of world-class competition and training facilities for amateur, Olympic, collegiate and professional athletes. The $150 million privately financed facility was developed and is operated by AEG on a 125-acre site on the campus of California State University, Dominguez (CSUDH) Hills in Carson, California. The Home Depot Center features a 13,000-seat tennis stadium, a 27,000-seat stadium for soccer, rugby, lacrosse and other athletic competitions and outdoor concerts, a 10,000-seat facility for track & field, The Home Depot Center Velodrome (a 2,450-seat indoor velodrome for cycling) and other facilities for softball, baseball, beach volleyball, basketball and other sports. The Home Depot Center is home to three professional sports teams - Major League Soccer's 2005 MLS and U.S. Open Cup Champion Los Angeles Galaxy; Club Deportivo (CD) Chivas USA; and Women's Professional Soccer's (WPS) Los Angeles Sol. Named an Official U.S. Olympic Training Site, The Home Depot Center is also home of the United States Tennis Association (USTA) USA Tennis High Performance Training Center as well as the national team training headquarters for the U.S. Soccer Federation (USSF). The David Beckham Academy for youth soccer, Andre Agassi's Safe Passage All-Stars at-risk youth tennis program and the nationally recognized Athletes' Performance training center for elite and professional athletes are all based at The Home Depot Center. The Home Depot Center has additionally been designated official training sites for USA Cycling, USA Track & Field and the USTA.