The annual Tennessee Valley Open Championships start this afternoon at Manker Patten Tennis Club and run through Sunday. The TVOC provides $13,000 in prize money for its open divisions and also has age-group competition for 35s and older in men's and women's singles and doubles and mixed doubles.
Golf
* Cohen Trolio of West Point, Miss., took the first-round lead with a 67 Tuesday in the Evitt Foundation RTC Junior All-Star tournament at WindStone Golf Club, but Naravan Mohan of Charlotte and Bruce Murphy of Johns Creek, Ga., are only a stroke behind and Jason Quinlan of Cumming, Ga., and Hanseung Chang of South Korea by way of Austin, Texas, are at 69. Harrison Davis of Fort Payne, Ala., is in a five-way tie for sixth at 70, and Cleveland resident Hannah Nall similarly is tied for sixth at 75 in the girls' division of the AJCA event that ends Thursday. Ohio residents Leila Raines and Ashley Zi-Tong Au share a three-stroke girls' lead with their 70s. Kyndall Shamblin of Cleveland, Tenn., is 17th at 78. Ringgold's Bennett McNabb is tied for 17th among the boys with a 73, while Fort Oglethorpe's Tucker Windham is at 75 and Chattanooga's Joe Carter is at 77.
Softball
* Covenant College has hired former Cedarville University standout Jessica Palm to assist softball coach Christine Engbers. Palm has been a graduate assistant the last two years at St. Francis in Illinois, which won 74 games during that time and went 43-7 and reached the NAIA national tournament this year. She played in a program-record 215 games as a four-year shortstop (2012-15) for Cedarville, with 214 starts, and had a career batting average of .279 with 169 hits, 50 for extra bases, and 89 runs batted in. She helped lead the Ohio team to three NCCAA national appearances. "Jessica brings a ton of experience from both her time as an athlete and as a graduate assistant," Engbers said in a Covenant release. "I anticipate that she will take our infield play to the next level and will connect well with our team from the get-go." Said Palm: "I feel very blessed to continue coaching softball and am very excited to do so at a Christ-centered school such as Covenant. I look forward to investing in the lives of these student-athletes."