By Palm Beach Business.com

Ivo Karlovic of Serbia during Monday's match.

DELRAY BEACH — Fourth-seeded Ivo Karlovic of Croatia overcame a second-set surge from Dustin Brown of Germany to win his first-round match 6-3, 6-7(3), 6-2 in Monday's nightcap at the Delray Beach Open by the Venetian Las Vegas.

Monday was the opening day of main-draw competition in the ATP World Tour portion of the Delray event.

Karlovic took advantage of mistakes by Brown to take the lead in the opening set, then cruised the rest of the way. In the second set, neither player could break the service of the other. The closest to a break came with Brown leading 5-4. Brown took the game to duce, but with the set on the line, Karlovic finished with the next two points to force the tiebreaker.

Brown jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the tiebreaker; Karlovic cut it to 4-3, but Brown took the next three points to take the set and even the match. But that was as close as it got, as Karlovic easily won the final set to take the match.

Karlovic will play the winner of Tuesday's match between Filip Krajinovic of Serbia and Thanasi Kokkinakis of Australia.

Earlier in the day, wild card Denis Kudla of the United States beat Slovak Lukas Lacko 6-3, 6-4, and Alexandr Dolgopolov of the Ukraine, the tournament's No. 3 seed, defeated Russian Teymuraz Gabashvili 7-6(4), 6-3 in the afternoon.

The tournament's top two seeds begin play Tuesday evening. Top seed and former Delray champion Kevin Anderson of South Afrida will play qualifier John-Patrick Smith of Australia at 6, while No. 2 John Isner of the United States plays Marinko Matosevic after 8 p.m. Isner is the top ranked American in the world, at 18 in the ATP standings. Anderson is 15th.

The most intriguing match of the day might be Tim Smyczek of the U.S. vs wild card entry Stefan Kozlov, also of the U.S. Kozlov is 17 years old, and hails from Pembroke Pines. Kozlov reached the final of the Australian and Wimbledon juniors, and won the Orange Bowl Tennis Championships in December.

The tournament has a second 17-year-old playing in the main draw, Andrey Rublev of Russia. Rublev was the the world's No. 1 junior player, while Kozlov was No. 3. Both are looking for their first ATP World Tour match.

Kozlov and Smyczek will be playing on court 1, sometime early to mid-afternoon.

Tuesday's stadium court schedule:

— 11 a.m. Mikhail Kukushking of Kazakstan vs. Steve Johnson of the U.S.

— Not Before 12:30 p.m. Sam Querrey of the U.S., the tournament' No. 6 seed, vs. Alejandro Gonzales of Colombia.

— Not Before 2:30 p.m., Ivan Dodig of Croatia vs. Donald Young of the U.S.

— 6 p.m. Anderson vs. Smith

— Not Before 8 p.m. Matosevic vs. Isner.

Doubles competition begins after 3 p.m. on courts 1 and 4 at the Delray Beach Tennis Center.