WHAT HAPPENED: Dominic Thiem made history on Wednesday night in Arthur Ashe Stadium, defeating 21st seed Alex de Minaur, 6-1, 6-2, 6-4, to become the first Austrian ever to reach the semifinals of the US Open.
It marked the No. 2 seed’s second win over de Minaur in New York, having also bested the speedy Sydney native in the opening round here in 2017. De Minaur, 21, was bidding to become youngest US Open semifinalist since Juan Martin del Potro in 2009.
“I had a great feeling from the first moment on,” said Thiem, who moves on to face 2019 US Open finalist Daniil Medvedev.
“There is no Roger, Rafa, Novak, but there is Daniil, Sascha and Pablo now,” he said. “There are three other amazing players. Every single one of us deserves this first major title. Everybody will give it all. Once we step on the court, those other three are forgotten anyway.”
The mustachioed de Minaur was in trouble early on. After rain forced a roof closure, Thiem broke for 3-1 and 5-1, subsequently serving out the opening set at the 40-minute mark.
A runner-up to Novak Djokovic earlier this year at the Australian Open, Thiem was soon up a set and a break. With de Minaur ahead 40-love on his serve at 2-all, Thiem reeled off five straight points for 3-2. A double fault, de Minaur’s second of the match, would hand Thiem another break two games later.
Ranked a career-high No. 3, Thiem opened the third set with his sixth service break of the match. De Minaur would later bring the set back on serve, only to be broken again in the ninth game. As commentator Leif Shiras put it, it was “firepower overcoming horsepower.”
The Lleyton Hewitt-mentored De Minaur, who was appearing in his first major quarterfinal, is still seeking his first Top 5 win.
The stats were stacked in Thiem’s favor. He won 83 percent (43 of 52) of his first-serve points, and charted 11 aces, 43 winners, and 31 unforced errors in the two-hour-and-four-minute match.
WHAT IT MEANS: One thing is for sure: A new Grand Slam champion will be crowned for the first time at the US Open since Marin Cilic won it all in 2014. Thiem, a three-time runner-up at the Slams, would like to be that man. But the 26-year-old still has some work ahead of him, beginning with No. 3 seed Medvedev. The Russian, who pushed Rafael Nadal to the very limit in the 2019 US Open final, is hellbent on showing that last year’s result was no fluke. Medvedev, 24, dispatched countryman and former junior foe Andre Rublev earlier on Wednesday, 7-6, 6-3, 7-6. Thiem holds a slight 2-1 edge in career meetings, though Medvedev claimed their most recent encounter during his summer sprint last year in Montreal.
MATCH POINT: Thiem led the ATP Tour with 211 wins between 2016 and 2019, qualifying for the ATP Finals each year. He defeated Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic en route to 2019 ATP Finals championship match.
