WHAT HAPPENED: The stage was set for a Friday matinée, and it saw two blockbuster-worthy performers, Americans Ben Shelton and Frances Tiafoe, debunk the general truth that the sequel is never better than the original release.
The ending, as well as every part of the Round 3 match, was just as thrilling, but Tiafoe flipped the script in the most dramatic of fashion.
Tiafoe dug deep and came through with another signature victory in New York, as the No. 20 seed got his revenge on fellow American and good friend Shelton, knocking out the No. 13 seed 4-6, 7-5, 6-7(5), 6-4, 6-3, in 4 hours and 3 minutes in front of a capacity crowd inside Arthur Ashe Stadium. The win comes almost one year to the day when Shelton, on his way to the semifinals, defeated Tiafoe in four sets in the first matchup between Black American players in the quarterfinals of a Grand Slam.
“Ben's an incredible player, man, and he comes up with the goods a lot. It was definitely a tough match,” Tiafoe said. “But I think, I'm not just saying this because we just spoke in the locker room, but I think the level was a lot higher this year than we played last year throughout the five sets.”
The power, the finesse, the deft touch at the net and the fourth-wall-breaking stares from one combatant/friend to the other across the net after thrilling rallies were all present from both players once more, and after the first three sets, all of one point separated the two, with the former Florida Gator, Shelton, holding a 111-110 advantage in total points won.
And exactly like those first three sets in 2023, Shelton held a razor-thin lead after winning the third set in a tiebreak. But unlike last year’s quarterfinal, where Shelton’s first big breakout performance in New York mixed in with Tiafoe’s past successes in New York caused many in the crowd to be conflicted with their rooting interests, the audience clearly took on a more partisan vibe for Tiafoe as the match progressed, with a “TI-A-FOE! TI-A-FOE!” chant ringing out inside of Ashe as Shelton was serving for the set at 5-3 and was facing a break point against him. Immediately after those chants, Shelton double faulted and the match was back on serve. Three consecutive holds later then set up what turned out to be a topsy-turvy tiebreak.
Shelton won the first six points of the breaker only for Tiafoe to win the next five. Finally, Shelton closed the tiebreak with an ace, and the scene was set for a 2023 redux, where Shelton cruised in the fourth set as a dispirited Tiafoe wilted.
Tiafoe did not follow the lines on that part of the script, and instead continued to make inroads on the Shelton serve. After four previous unsuccessful break-point opportunities in the fourth set, Tiafoe finally converted on set point to tie the match and, as crucially, serve to begin the fifth.
As Tiafoe held his nerve on serve in the final set, Shelton, who reached for his left ankle a couple of times earlier in the match and appeared exhausted toward the end of the match, blinked on his second service game of the final frame. After Tiafoe’s forehand volley at net secured the break for a 3-1 lead, he put his foot on the gas the rest of the way, a stark contrast to when Tiafoe faded and won only two more games after losing the third-set tiebreak in last year’s contest.
“I think it's been something I have been doing much better. I just don't lay down. Having pride in myself, just don't lay down,” Tiafoe said. “I mean, I've been working on myself so much. I have a mental guy, process guy, and I've been working on myself, trying to just look at the glass differently. You know, I just want to, [whether I] win or lose matches, knowing the guy beat me. I didn't beat myself. No free lunches. I'm not trying to help my opponent get over the line."
The new partnership that Tiafoe forged with coach David Witt paid dividends the most today on the return of serve, as Frances had a whopping 21 break-point chances against the normally impregnable Shelton serve. Though Tiafoe converted just five of those chances, two of them came on his last two opportunities: set point in the fourth and the only opportunity in the fifth to take that 3-1 lead.
“Since I've been on tour, today was probably the best that anyone has returned my serve that I have seen,” Shelton said. “From early in the match, there was one where I went big out wide, like 130, and he cracked it down the line clean, hit the baseline, and I was, like, ‘Oh, one of those days.’”
WHAT IT MEANS: As it turns out, the potential mouthwatering match-up between Tiafoe and No. 2 seed Novak Djokovic in the fourth round will not come to pass, as the 24-time Grand Slam champion was eliminated in four sets by Alexei Popyrin in the first night session match inside Arthur Ashe Stadium on Friday.
Time to relax for Tiafoe? Not in the slightest. Popyrin came into New York soon after the biggest title of his career at the ATP Masters 1000 event in Montreal, and he is now 9-1 since the start of the summer hard court swing.
“He's always been really talented. He's starting to put it together,” Tiafoe said, who added, “It's going to be tough. He's going to serve big, big forehand, come to the net, do all those things. You have to be ready.”
It will be the first-ever meeting between the two players, and the 25-year-old Aussie also gave praise to the man who will be across the net from him on Sunday.
“[Frances is] actually a really good friend of mine. We get along really well off the court,” Popyrin said after the Djokovic win. “It will be interesting to play against him. We have practiced a bunch of times. He's a very tricky player. Probably has one of the best hands on tour, comes into the net a lot, likes to mix it up. That's going to be the tough part.”
They’re also good friends who will finally be playing against each other on the tour, something that Tiafoe has teased Popyrin about in the past.
“Playing Frances will be quite an experience because there have been a few times where I have kind of lost the round before having to play Frances, and he's always telling me, ‘Man, why do you keep losing before we play each other?,’” Popyrin said jokingly. “Yeah, luckily this time I was able to do it and hopefully it will be a good match.”
MATCH POINT: Tiafoe has now reached the fourth round of the US Open for a fifth consecutive year, and is now the first American man to reach that round in five consecutive years since Andre Agassi pulled off the feat between 2001 and 2005. Shelton, though a mainstay in the world’s Top 20 in his young career, is now 0-8 this year against fellow members of that club.
