Fifth-seeded Tomlinson, a first-year university student in Dunedin, eliminated second seed Paddy Ou, third seed Mitchell Sizemore and top seed Alex Calder, all in straight sets.
In the final against Calder, a former three-time national junior singles champion, Tomlinson showed an all-court game with no weaknesses, and an ability to stay in a point when under pressure. He won 6-2, 6-4.
Calder’s best shots were the more impressive and he got some cheap points at times from well-disguised drop shots, but his error rate was also higher as he made a return to competitive play.
Price reversed her recent Queenstown Open loss to Megan Rogers with a 7-6, 3-6, 6-1 win in a match in which Rogers had more power, especially on serve and forehand, but also made enough errors to keep Price in the game.
Rogers, formerly of Waikato and now from Wanaka, raced to a 4-1 lead but was taken to a tiebreak which she lost 7-4 in the first set. This proved vital as she was struggling with a chest infection and, although she was able to fight back for a 6-3 second-set win, she began to fight also for every breath as well as points and Price (16) finished the stronger.
In the men’s semifinals, Sizemore took a 3-1 lead over Tomlinson and looked comfortable, but then he appeared to go into his shell to lose five games in a row. He tried an aggressive restart but made several mistakes especially on his usual forehand weapon.
Carlos Reid led Calder 6-2 after a fired-up opening stanza, and had seven break points in the second set without being able to convert and Calder took his chance and won 6-4, then dominated thereafter to win the third 6-1.
The men’s doubles semifinals went to Reid and Sizemore 7-5, 7-6 over Josh McDermott and Tomlinson, and Calder and Michael Wilson, who beat Ou and Thomas Chiang 6-3, 6-2.
Outsiders completed the clean sweep when Calder and Wilson came from 2-5 down in the first set of the final to force a tiebreak, then held on in a tense 7-5 second set.
On Saturday, three of the four men’s seeds cruised into the semifinals with comfortable straight-sets wins.
The exception was second seed Ou, who lost two close tiebreaks to Tomlinson. Both were 7-5 scores and both players had chances, but it was Tomlinson who came up with the consistency on the big points.
Calder beat Nelson student Henry Neas 6-3, 6-2, Reid eliminated McDermott 6-3, 6-3 and Sizemore was too powerful for Wellington student Wilson, dropping only one game.
As expected, Price and Rogers dominated the women’s singles early rounds. Price dropped only two games in beating Ilana Goossens and Mackenzie Phillips and Rogers won even more easily against Beverley Jiang and Eliza Booth, who both failed to trouble the scorer.
In the women’s doubles final on Saturday, Price and Rogers found themselves down 1-3 early against Gabby Grady (South Canterbury) and Phillips (North Otago) but rallied to win 6-3, 6-1.
