“The promotion for the tournament was insane, and it was really awesome to see how many people came out just to support tennis and come to support all the players,” Velaga said. “It was really, really cool, especially because I was able to have my family there, my teammates there, all my friends from college. It was a really incredible experience.”

“I’ve never seen the courts so full,” Velaga added.

The stands paused and watched with rapt attention whenever play resumed. Occasional cries from Velaga’s supporters and applause were the only noises interrupting tennis shoe squeaks from the Plexipave acrylic court.

Velaga was an unseeded wild card entering the tournament, hoping to earn her spot in the qualifying rounds by defeating No. 3 tournament seed and WTA-ranked No. 639 Ekaterina Ovcharenko. 

The odds were stacked against the senior, but according to Ashley Lunkenheimer, the vice president of Sisters Sports Group, an organization that works to create local networks to promote women’s sports, Velaga was winning just by showing up and giving the crowd a “hometown hero” to root for.

***

Women’s tennis has a deep history in the City of Brotherly Love. In 1887, then-17-year-old Ellen Hansell became the first United States women’s national singles champion at her home Philadelphia Cricket Club.

Just over three decades later, fellow Philadelphian Ora Washington earned national acclaim as the “queen of two courts,” earning a spot in both the U.S. Tennis Association Hall of Fame and the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame. From 1920 to 1930, a Black woman from Germantown was at the top of the global doubles rankings, inspiring another wave of hometown pride.

Although Lunkenheimer grew up playing basketball and rugby, women’s tennis defined her perception of female athletes. Her childhood was soundtracked by Elton John’s “Philadelphia Freedom,” a musical tribute to feminist tennis trailblazer Billie Jean King.

As a teenager, Lunkenheimer began idolizing tennis star Jennifer Capriati after seeing her play in Philadelphia. Capriati’s power on the court even inspired Lunkenheimer to begin using the beauty product Oil of Olay in an attempt to emulate the rising star. She still uses it today.

As a two-time All-American rugby player at Amherst College and the first-ever team captain of the U.S. Women’s Under-23 National Rugby Team, Lunkenheimer understands what it means to show up for women’s sports both on and off the court.

“My dream is to give our city the pride that we deserve, [show] that Philly is a women’s sports town. And every time something comes here like this, we do it with care to make it really special,” Lunkenheimer said. “That’s our duty to the kids, so that they get to grow up and say, ‘I could be like her,’ or ‘I could get her autograph,’ or ‘she bothered to come.’” 

And last weekend, the comedian and actress Wanda Sykes did show up, making an appearance at the WTA tournament to cheer on the competition.

While Sykes’ celebrity endorsement attracted national attention and increased foot traffic to the tournament, her wife, Alexandra Niedbalski-Sykes, is the brains behind the operation.

Niedbalski-Sykes, a Sisters Sports Group co-founder, began her sports business career working for the WTA in France. When she expressed interest in working on the world tour, her bosses sent her to the United States for six months for English language immersion. She’s been here ever since.

In 2019, Niedbalski-Sykes co-founded the Philly Sisters Sports Group after a conversation with an NBA executive kept coming back to a single question: Why didn’t Philadelphia, the sixth-largest city in the United States, have a single women’s professional sports team?

In the following years, the Philly Sisters became the backbone behind the city’s campaign for a WNBA expansion team, influencing the Philadelphia 76ers to submit an ownership bid. When the dust settled in June 2025, Philadelphia was one of three new franchises added to the WNBA.

With Niedbalski-Sykes’ background in tennis, the next item on the bucket list was obvious — bringing the WTA back to its birthplace of Philadelphia.

After securing Ennoble Care as a title sponsor and raising over 90% of the total sponsorship revenue, the stage was set, but there were still concerns about the feasibility of the event.

“Two weeks ago, we were still wondering. It wasn’t sold out, and that’s the only way we can do it here with women’s sports in Philadelphia,” Niedbalski-Sykes said. “We have to crush it, we have to do better than everybody, and for the game and the day to be selling out and sold out, it’s sending this huge message to everybody.”

***

As one of the only collegians in the field, Velaga was making a statement and her supporters in the crowd were rooting for an upset. It was even through the first set, with Velaga rebounding whenever Ovcharenko got the upper hand.

By the fifth game of the first set, Ovcharenko and Velaga settled into a rhythm, trading advantage points whenever a game went to a deuce. Serve speeds regularly exceeded 100 miles per hour as Velaga sought to prove she could hang with Ovcharenko, defying the expectation of an easy battle between an unranked rookie and an experienced veteran.

“Obviously [it’s my] first pro tournament, I was very nervous,” Velaga said after the match. “There were definitely a lot of nerves and tension I had to overcome in the beginning, but I knew my level was there and I knew I could compete in the match, no matter what.”

The Colmar, Pa., native steadily built momentum throughout the first set, taking a second point in the sixth game, but Ovcharenko ultimately took the set, 6-2.

Velaga would bounce back after the break, securing the first two games of the second set as Ovcharenko was foiled by strategic serves and net balls. Sneaky slow lobs snuck past the senior as Ovcharenko claimed the next three games in the set after game point deuces. More back-and-forth play ensued, but Ovcharenko came out on top once again, capturing the set and the match with a 6-4 victory.

Velaga was back on the court Monday evening for her professional doubles debut alongside teammate and junior Lara Stojanovski, who earned All-Ivy Honorable Mention Doubles honors with Velaga last season. After another hard-fought battle, the duo fell to the No. 2 doubles seed, Miriam Skoch and Jesika Maleckova, 6-4, 6-2.

***

Molly Viscardi, a 2014 Nursing Ph.D. graduate and chief financial officer of Ennoble Care, watched her fellow Quakers battle it out from the sidelines.

Viscardi is no stranger to athletics at Penn. She spent a season on the rowing team as a freshman and camped outside of the Palestra for men’s basketball season tickets, attending every single game during the 2002-03 season.

Despite her interest and involvement in the Philadelphia sports scene as a mom of two young athletes and a Philadelphia Phillies season ticket-holder, Viscardi realized she hadn’t been to a women’s professional sporting event until she attended the Unrivaled Basketball League last January. By her own admission, she cried “multiple times” after seeing so many women and girls come together to support professional women’s sports.

As her 8-year-old daughter explores sports, including tennis, the value of watching professional women’s sports is becoming more and more apparent, Viscardi said. There’s a special sense of inspiration when girls watch professional female athletes excel at the sports they love.

Viscardi couldn’t emphasize enough how excited she was for her daughter to watch the tennis pros at work in her hometown.

“When I went to Unrivaled and I realized that I had never been to a women’s sporting event, it’s like you don’t even realize how it sets your image of the world,” Viscardi said. “I didn’t realize that I’d grown up really just thinking men are big and powerful and strong and stuff like that.”

“I really hope with sports and a lot of things my kids can have a little bit of difference [and think] this is normal, not think like, ‘Oh my God, there are women playing sports,’” Viscardi added.

No matter who ultimately takes the singles and doubles crowns at the end of the tournament, the tournament is here to stay for at least two more years, while Penn women’s tennis’ season kicks off on Sept. 11 with the Tribe Invitational.

As Velaga looks forward to her final season with the Quakers, she’s confident that the tournament and a renewed interest in women’s tennis in Philadelphia will draw more spectators to home matches.

“It means a lot that people were willing to come out and just experience a women’s-only professional tournament,” Velaga said. “I feel like a lot of the tournaments played, they’re co-ed, and to really highlight women’s sports was amazing.”

---