site.btaDeja Vu: After Wimbledon Success, Both Ivanov and Vasilev Reach Quarterfinals at US Open Juniors Championships

After winning the Wimbledon trophy in July, Bulgarian tennis talent Ivan Ivanov qualified for the quarterfinals of the US Open Junior Championships without losing a set. On Thursday in New York, he recorded a 7-6(3) 6-4 win over American Maximus Dussault. The Bulgarian will meet Max Schoenhaus in the next round. Ivanov is the current world No. 1 in the World Tennis tour Juniors Rankings while Schoenhaus stands at No. 11 but is the 8th seed at the tournament.

The other Bulgarian still standing at the US Open 2025 junior singles events, Alexander Vasilev, will also play at the quarterfinals after a dramatic two-hour-and-eighteen-minute battle with Czechia's Jan Kumstat which eventually ended in a 7-5 4-6 7-6(7) triumph for the Bulgarian. He will now meet 16-year-old American Andrew Johnson who is playing his first Grand Slam tournament.

This feels like a deja vu, as both Ivanov and Vasilev enjoyed deep runs at the previous Grand Slam juniors tournament. A historic all-Bulgarian final was a real possibility as they both reached the semifinals in London but Vasilev’s run was stopped by American Ronit Karki while Ivanov went on to lift the trophy.

“It is amazing that Bulgaria have two juniors in Top 5, Top 10,” Ivanov said, quoted by International Tennis Federation’s (ITF) official website. “But it would have been a lot of pressure playing each other (at Wimbledon).”

Now down to the final eight, Vasilev and Ivanov are again on opposite sides of the draw, two victories each away from having the match they did not get to have in the UK.

“If I were to get to the final and win it, it would be the cherry on top of my season,” Vasilev said quoted by the ITF. “I’ve learned a lot this year, and I don’t want to look ahead. But of course, if I could get to the final that would be amazing.”

Those results should not be taken for granted – with his win at Wimbledon, Ivanov became the second Bulgarian to get a Grand Slam juniors trophy after Grigor Dimitrov won both in London and New York in 2008.