WHAT HAPPENED: Carla Suárez Navarro has been a one-person Spanish Armanda, sinking the hopes of the French at the US Open.
The spunky, gritty 29-year-old Olympic veteran added a second top French player to her list of wins this week by outlasting sixth-seeded Caroline Garcia, 5-7, 6-4, 7-6, on a sun-filled Court 17 Saturday to reach the fourth round for the third consecutive year.
The nearly two-and-a-half-hour battle came one round after Suárez Navarro had beaten France’s number three player, Kristina Mladenovic, also in three bruising sets.
There was little to separate the No. 30-seeded Suárez Navarro and Garcia.
The Spaniard won 107 points; Garcia, 102. Suárez Navarro made 30 winners against 42 errors while the Frenchwoman had 33 winners and 46 errors. And while neither player is a feared server, there were just four service breaks in the match, three coming in the opening set and the last one in the first game of the second set.
All total, Garcia had six break points and Suárez Navarro just four with each converting two of them.
Suárez Navarro took the lead in the tiebreak at 3-2 when Garcia netted a forehand to lose her serve. The Spaniard extended the lead to 5-2 by holding her serve on the next two points with a backhand winner and then a service winner.
Garcia, who was looking to be the first Frenchwoman in the round of 16 at the Open since Mladenovic in 2015, won the next two points on serve to pull to 4-5.
But, Suárez Navarro emphatically closed out the first career win in three tries against Garcia with another service winner and then a sizzling backhand winner for 7-4 before celebrating with several fist pumps.
"I had to be focused on my game and fight," Suarez Navarro told the appreciative fans. "It was a really tough match and so close every set. It was tough to be focused out there all the time."
WHAT DOES IT MEAN: Suárez Navarro is not big in size but she has played very big tennis at the majors through her career.
In 40 Grand Slam appearances, she has reached the quarterfinals six times – twice at Roland Garros, three times at the Australian Open, including this year, and at the 2013 US Open. At Wimbledon she made the fourth round twice.
Two years ago, Suárez Navarro was one of just four players to reach the fourth round or better at each of the majors.
MATCH POINT: With the loss of fourth-seeded Angelique Kerber, there is no seed in the top eight left in Suárez Navarro's quarter. She will next play the winner of the evening match between two former Grand Slam champions, No. 22 Maria Sharapova and No. 10 Jelena Ostapenko.
