Birthday win at Central Coast Tennis Classic sets milestone
Kayla Day and ball kids jumping into the Templeton Tennis Ranch Pool. Photo by Lori Sortino.
Kayla Day wins 7th pro singles title on 26th birthday
– Kayla Day celebrated her 26th birthday Sunday by winning her seventh pro singles title at the Central Coast Tennis Classic, becoming the first Californian to claim the tournament. Fans at Templeton Tennis Ranch sang “Happy Birthday” to her after the match.
After winning the first set, 6-2, against the No. 5 seeded Canadian Kayla Cross, Day was leading 3-0 in the second set when the serving Cross lost the first point. She then walked over to the chair umpire and informed her she was going to retire from the match because of a left hip injury.
After the trophy presentation and photos, Day, who turned 26 on Sunday, then joined about a dozen ball kids and jumped into the shallow end of the swimming pool, a tradition started last year after Renata Zarazua won the singles title a day before her 27th birthday and just days after the new pool at the Templeton Tennis Ranch opened.
“I expected a battle today and you never want to win that way so I’m sorry for Kayla,” Day told the crowd, later adding that “In those moments you just have to stay extra focused because you never know if she could come back.”
Cross said she injured her hip at the start of the match. “I went for a wide forehand and I could tell I had pulled something,” the 20-year-old LSU sophomore said. “During the first set it was getting worse and worse.”
Asked how she would rank the win among her seven career pro titles, the WTA world-ranked No. 345th player Day said, “It’s definitely up there. It’s my biggest title since I had my injury and me being from California and so close to home, it’s pretty special, especially on my birthday.”
Day, who was out for nine months after surgery on her right ankle, won two ITF W100 singles titles in 2023, the same year she reached the third round at the French Open.
Day, who earned 75 WTA ranking points, gave a shoutout to her longtime coach Larry Mousouris, who was a Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo All-American in the late 1960s. “Larry’s been my coach since I was 9 years old,” Day said. “Thanks to Larry for being here because he doesn’t get to travel with me very much.”
Mousouris couldn’t help but flash a smile or two on Kayla’s big day. “She’s worked very hard to get to this point,” he said. “But she knows there’s still a lot of work to do.”
