Top American Juniors Set to Compete at the 2025 ITF World Tennis Tour Junior Finals

The United States Tennis Association (USTA) announced that three top American juniors will compete at the ITF World Tennis Tour Junior Finals, set to take place October 22-26 at the Sichuan International Tennis Center in Chengdu, China.

The event brings together eight of the world’s best boys and girls and is the junior equivalent of the ATP and WTA Finals. Similar to those events, the competition features round-robin play followed by a knockout round. For the first time, the winners will each receive 1,000 ranking points—the same as a junior Grand Slam—offering a potentially critical boost toward finishing the year as the world No. 1 junior.

Three Americans—Jack Kennedy (17; Huntington, N.Y.), Ben Willwerth (18; Jupiter, Fla.) and Kristina Penickova (16; Campbell, Calif./Orlando, Fla.)—are among the 16 confirmed competitors heading to Chengdu. They’ll be joined by USTA national coach Jose Caballero.

Photo credit: ITF.

All three Americans have had successful 2025 campaigns on the international junior circuit. Kennedy won the boys’ doubles title at the US Open, while Penickova is the reigning Australian Open and Wimbledon girls’ doubles champion. She also reached the girls’ singles final in Melbourne. Willwerth, meanwhile, is a three-time boys’ Grand Slam finalist this year, having reached the singles final at the Australian Open and the doubles final at both Roland Garros and the US Open.

Since its debut in 2015, the ITF WTT Junior Finals has proved to be an important stepping stone for many of today’s stars—from Grand Slam champions Marketa Vondrousova, Elena Rybakina, Sofia Kenin and Jelena Ostapenko to Casper Ruud, Holger Rune, Andrey Rublev, Qinwen Zheng, Taylor Fritz, Leylah Fernandez, Lorenzo Musetti, Marta Kostyuk and Camila Osorio.

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Courtesy of USTA. Top photo: Ben Willwerth Top photo credit: ITF.