Chicago Smash to Face-off Against New York Empire in the World TeamTennis Final
(August 1, 2020) WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, W.V. – Sunday’s World TeamTennis Final features a match-up between the No. 3 seed Chicago Smash, in their inaugural season, take on the No. 4 seed New York Empire on CBS Broadcast Network at Noon ET/9 AM PT.
The Empire upset the top-seeded Philadelphia Freedoms 22-18, while the Smash were able to beat No. 2 seed Orlando Storm, 24-13 to set up the star-studded final.
Chicago is led by 2017 US Open Champion Sloane Stephens and also includes 9-time Grand Slam Champion (Mixed/Women’s Doubles) and 2020 WTT Female MVP Bethanie Mattek-Sands, and two-time Australian Open Champion Rajeev Ram (Men’s Doubles/Mixed Doubles).
“Being the MVP of the league is such a huge honor. I’m here for three weeks so you just go match by match. I was just ready to do what I needed for the team if that required mixed doubles, doubles, singles, bench, energy, whatever it took. It’s an MVP, but it still takes a team,” said Mattek-Sands.
New York will have six-time Major Champion/3-time US Open Singles Champion Kim Clijsters back in the lineup that also features three-time Grand Slam Men’s Doubles Champion and Olympic Gold Medalist (2016) Jack Sock and 2018 US Open Women’s Doubles Champion Coco Vandeweghe.
“The camaraderie and energy we have, we all feed off each other pretty well and play our best tennis. We are going to keep going. We don’t mind being the underdogs as the four seed,” said Sock.
The 2020 World TeamTennis season will be powered by Universal Tennis Rating (UTR), the world’s most accurate tennis rating system. All WTT matches will count towards players’ UTR rating, and MyUTR.com technology will be used to set daily matchups by WTT team coaches and be integrated in WTT’s media broadcasts throughout the three-week competition.
WTT introduced professional team tennis in 1974, with Billie Jean King serving as its co-founder. WTT is one of five active U.S. pro sports leagues which has been in operation for over 40 years, along with the NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB.
