Nishesh Basavareddy’s Memorable Second-Ever Pro Tennis Event In Vero Beach, Florida

By Randy Walker

@TennisPublisher

While the 2022 Mardy Fish Children’s Foundation Tennis Championships was only the second career professional tournament for Nishesh Basavareddy, it certainly will always be one of his most memorable.

The $15,000 U.S. Tennis Association Pro Circuit ITF World Tennis Tour event in Vero Beach, Florida always attracts the top U.S. junior players as it is a good clay court preparation tournament in the United States before the French Open junior championships. Basavareddy, a talented nearly 17-year-old up-and-comer from Carmel, Indiana, was a junior exemption entry into the tournament and was part of the U.S. Tennis Association Player Development contingent present at the event alongside fellow American juniors Alex Michelsen, Cooper Williams, Nico Godsick and Ethan Quinn.

I first met Nishesh when, as the event’s tournament director, he checked in to see if he could get a practice court and some balls. We chatted about him committing to play college tennis at Stanford for their head coach Paul Goldstein, who I had promoted and did publicity on during my days working for the USTA. I also discovered that we had the same May 2 birthday.

Recognizing that the audience in Vero Beach was always interested in watching the young American players compete, I immediately asked him if he was going to play doubles, so our fans could get at least two opportunities to watch him play. We always want to promote the young players to our fans and sponsors. Getting a player like Nishesh in singles and doubles just adds a little more value, even if Nishesh was only 16 years old.

Nishesh told me that he didn’t have a doubles partner and asked if we knew someone. Usually the young Americans all like to play with each other but it all were already paired up. I had just gotten off the phone with a player from Venezuela named Ricardo Rodriguez, who was driving up to Vero Beach from Miami and he said he was looking for a partner and to put his name in the doubles sign-in sheet. Rodriguez had become a friend since he had played our event four out of the previous five years – reaching the singles final in 2018 and 2021. He was kind of a fan favorite in Vero, becoming friends with many of our locals through the years.

Then a little light bulb went off in my head…Nishesh and Ricardo would make for a good team. With Nishesh being a 16-year-old kid, he could probably benefit from playing with a 28-year-old veteran like Ricardo, who was the all-time leading Davis Cup player for Venezuela. I gave Ricardo’s number to Nishesh and suggested enthusiastically that they play together and that we thought they would be a good team. The two did speak and agreed to sign in together, despite having not even having met in person yet.

When the doubles entries closed, David Littlefield, the USTA Tour Supervisor, presented me with the list of the players who were accepted in the doubles draw and, unfortunately, Nishesh and Ricardo were the first team out of getting in the tournament. However, we still had one wild card entry left to give out. Normally, we would host wild card tournaments for all our wild cards, but because we were just getting over COVID era, we did not hold a doubles wild card tournament and we still had a doubles wild card to give. We had a choice between giving the wild card to Nishesh and Ricardo or, the best other option was a pair of talented local players, who did not have ATP ranking points, but would provide some local excitement to our fans.

I felt that we should give the wild card to Nishesh, who was a young American, and Ricardo, because he was a fan favorite and supported our event for so many years. Tom Fish, Mardy Fish’s father and the co-tournament director for the event, agreed with me so we awarded them the wild card entry.

Nishesh and Ricardo played well together from the start and they beat eventual singles champion Sekou Bangoura of the USA and Sathi Chirala of India in the first round, then the American team of Ethan Quinn and Nico Godsick (who would win the USTA Boy’s 18 doubles title and win a round at the U.S. Open later in the year) in the quarterfinals. Peter Bertran of the Dominican Republic and Mwendwa Mbithi of the USA were then their victims in the semifinals which featured Ricardo hitting a rare around-the-post winner as he discussed in his post-match interview with Nishesh as seen here: https://youtu.be/OuxnOxkWWrk?si=ivbwLlne5Bj-Grlc

This impromptu pairing of Nishesh and Ricardo were indeed an exciting pairing for the local Vero Beach fans and, after and an exciting final-round victory against Liam Draxl of Canada and Millen Hurrion of Great Britain, they were the tournament champions. From not knowing each other until they played their first round match, to being the last team accepted into the tournament, Nishesh Basavareddy and Ricardo Rodriguez were the doubles champions. Their doubles award ceremony can be watched here: https://youtu.be/iR4ya55sJbc?si=fBO07vUp-WR_RZRe

In his second career professional tournament, Nishesh won his first career professional title. I told Ricardo that Nishesh will always remember him because of that. And certainly Nishesh will never forget Vero Beach.