LONG BEACH, Calif. (Jan. 12, 2015) – Four of the eight seeded players in action on the first day of main-draw play at the Long Beach Pro Futures Tournament taking place this week at the El Dorado Park Tennis Center won their matches in straight sets on Tuesday.

Top-seeded and former UCLA star Nicolas Meister beat Los Alamitos High senior and future USC Trojan Riley Smith, 7-5, 6-1. Granted a wild card into the tournament, Smith last year led his high school team to the CIF-Southern Section Division I team title.

Meister graduated from UCLA in 2012 with All-America honors in singles that year and doubles honors from the 2009-10 season. Later in the day, Meister and Eric Quigley, seeded No. 2 in doubles, beat American’s Daunte Harris and Timothy Sah, 6-2, 6-3, in the first round of doubles.

Meister is the Long Beach defending doubles champion and captured his 10th career USTA Pro Circuit/ITF-level doubles title at the end of 2015 in Tallahassee, Fla.

The No. 3-seeded Quigley, who played his college tennis at the University of Kentucky, had a similar score line as Meister in singles as he beat former Illinois All American Dennis Nevolo, 6-1, 7-6 (5).

West Covina’s Ernesto Escobedo, No. 6, got past Great Britain’s Joe Salisbury, 7-6 (4), 6-2, while former Michigan standout Evan King, No. 7, dropped just three games to fellow American Jean-Yves Aubone, 6-2, 6-1

On Wednesday, both recent USC Pro Futures singles finalists will be in action as 17-year-old No. 4-seed Stefan Kozlov meets recently turned 18-year-old Michael Mmoh and No. 2 Philip Bester takes on former USC No. 1 Yannick Hanfmann.

This is the second consecutive year the USTA Pro Circuit event will take place in Long Beach. The prize money has increased from $15,000  last year to $25,000  this year.