WHAT HAPPENED: If there happened to be a television show called American Tennis Teen Titans which followed the exploits of the young women superheroes of U.S. tennis, Amanda Anisimova, the 2017 US Open girl’s junior champion, would surely be the team leader. Anisimova, who turned 19 on Monday, is seeded for a third time at a major and is a seasoned veteran compared to the American teen she faced today: 16-year-old Katrina Scott, who received a wild card into the 2020 US Open to make her Grand Slam main-draw debut.
Scott, ranked No. 637, started off the second-round match impressively, breaking the No. 22 seed in the first set to go ahead, 3-1, and had a couple of opportunities in Anisimova’s next service game to get another break, but couldn’t convert them. Those missed chances almost came back to haunt her. Serving for the opening set at 5-3, Scott relinquished two set points and Anisimova broke her. Undaunted, the newcomer returned the favor in Anisimova’s next service game to take the set.
Despite Anisimova’s firepower off both wings, Scott couldn’t be moved off the baseline all match long. Excelling on both offense and defense, the younger American went toe-to-toe with Anisimova through the first eight games of the second set. But just as Scott neared the finish line, potentially two games away, Anisimova rose up impressively to claim the set, 6-4, and turned the match around.
Having finally gotten the measure of Scott’s game, Anismova broke her in the first game of the third set and never looked back. Anisimova’s big-match experience ultimately paid off.
“She was playing amazing—not that I was having a bad day,” Ansimova said in her post-match interview. “I’m extremely happy, not just with my win, but how I came back.”
WHAT IT MEANS: Anisimova, who entered 2020 as the youngest teenager in the Top 50, won her first WTA title last year at Bogata, making her, at age 17, the youngest American women to win a title since Serena Williams in 1999. If Anisimova gets past Maria Sakkari in her next match, she could face Williams in the Round of 16.
MATCH POINT: At last year’s Roland Garros, Anisimova defeated defending champion Simona Halep in the quarterfinals to become the first player (male or female) born in the 2000s to reach the semifinal of a Grand Slam tournament.
