Michael Zheng

Zheng was born in 2004 to Joe Zheng and Mei. His parents emigrated from Hubei, China, to the United States. ^[2]

Zheng is a current senior playing tennis at Columbia University. Raised in Montville, New Jersey, Zheng attended Delbarton School, where he won the state singles tennis championship in 2021. For his senior year, he transferred to Dwight Global Online School in order to accommodate his travel demands for tennis.^[3][4]

Zheng reached the final of the Wimbledon boys' singles tournament in 2022, losing in the final to Mili Poljičak.^[5][6][7] In the 2022–23 season, his first year at Columbia, he became the first first-year student athlete at the school to be named an ITA All-American, in addition to being the first Ivy League tennis player to win Ivy League Player of the Year, Rookie of the Year, and First-Team All-Ivy in singles and doubles all in the same season.^[8][9]

He represented Columbia at the 2023 NCAA tennis tournament in singles, where he was eliminated by Michigan's Ondřej Štyler in the Round of 16.^[10] In his sophomore season, Zheng reached the final of the 2024 NCAA Division I tennis men's singles championships, where he lost to Filip Planinšek of Alabama.^[11] In the start of his junior year, the NCAA decided to move up the individual NCAA tournaments to the fall season instead of the spring season. There he once again reached the final of the Division I tennis men's singles championships. On November 24, 2024, he defeated Ozan Baris of Michigan State to become the first NCAA singles champion from Columbia since 1906, and the first Ivy League NCAA singles champion since 1922.^[12][13][14] On November 23, 2025, Zheng defeated Trevor Svajda of SMU to become the first back-to-back NCAA champion since Steve Johnson in 2011 & 2012.^[15]

Zheng reached his first ATP Challenger final at the 2023 Caribbean Open, losing to Kei Nishikori.^[16]

In May 2025, Zheng reached the final of the 2025 Little Rock Challenger, losing to Patrick Kypson.^[17] In July, Zheng reached his first Challenger doubles final at the 2025 Cranbrook Tennis Classic with Theodore Winegar.^[18] In August, Zheng won his first Challenger title in Chicago, defeating Hsu Yu-hsiou in the final.^[19] He then won two more Challenger titles at Columbus and Tiburon with a 15 matches win streak.^{[citation needed]}

In 2026, Zheng made it through 3 rounds of qualifying matches, including a tight 4–6, 6–3, 7–6^(12–10) three-set win over Lukáš Klein, to make the main draw at the 2026 Australian Open, his first main draw appearance at a Grand Slam. In the first round, he defeated Sebastian Korda in 5 sets, marking his first win at a Grand Slam main draw.^[20]