Emma Navarro named ITA National Rookie of the Year

Posted on Monday, Jun. 21, 2021, 2:47 pm

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Courtesy UVA Media Relations

Emma Navarro returns a volley in the finals of the 2021 NCAA Women’s Tennis Singles Championship. Photo courtesy NCAA/USTA.

Emma Navarro has been named the ITA National Rookie of the Year.

Navarro (Charleston, S.C.), who was named the ITA Atlantic Region Rookie of the Year last week, was one of 12 women’s players to receive the award on a regional level and make up the pool eligible for the national award. The national winners were selected from the regional winners by the national awards committee for each division.

Navarro, the 2021 NCAA Singles Champion, was an All-American in both singles and doubles, amassing a 25-1 record in former. Navarro and her partner Rosie Johanson were the first doubles team in program history to advance to the semifinals of the NCAA Doubles Championship. The All-ACC first team honoree was a finalist for the Honda Sports Award for tennis and was the third player in program history to reach a No. 1 ITA singles ranking.

She went 10-1 against ranked opponents this year and was 12-1 in the ACC at the No. 1 slot in a conference that holds the top-three spots in the ITA singles rankings. She had regular-season notable wins this season against No. 3 Alexa Graham, No. 5 Anna Rogers, and No. 8 Giulia Pairone with three additional top-20 victories against Kenya Jones (13), Kelly Chen (17), and Carolyn Campana (15).

Navarro is the third Cavalier to be named the National Rookie of the Year, joining her teammate Natasha Subhash, who won it last year, and Julia Elbaba in 2013.