Young, Isner Wildcard Winners at US Open
I watched as much of the Young and Isner wins as the USA Network would let me (I've got to start researching the DirecTV option, I guess) and was very impressed by the two wildcards' composure after losing their first sets in tiebreakers. Young played excellent tennis with 68 winners and only 20 unforced errors (can that be right? it's an amazing ratio) in his 6-7, 6-3, 6-2, 6-3 win over Chris Guccione of Australia. The point in the fourth at 3-5 15-30 with Guccione serving to stay in the match was an instant classic, demonstrating how lethal Young's speed and court coverage can be.
Isner, of course, possesses other weapons, his first and second serve to be precise, and in his 6-7, 7-6, 7-6, 6-4 upset of No. 26 seed Jarkko Nieminen of Finland, he displayed them, hitting 34 aces and averaging 114 mph on his second serve.
The other U.S. wildcards didn't fare as well. Lauren Albanese, Alexa Glatch and Audra Cohen lost in straight sets, with Cohen winning the most games, five. Jesse Levine won only five games in three sets against No. 4 seed Nikolay Davydenko, but he was the subject of an upbeat post by Peter Bodo in his Tennis World blog. His doubles partner, Alex Kuznetsov, also fell in straight sets to No. 28 seed Nicolas Almagro of Spain. (The doubles draws were released today).
Wildcards Madison Brengle, Ashley Weinhold and Mike McClune play on Tuesday.
The New York Times has a US Open blog going, and today's entries include one on Levine and one on Young. I've been approached by one of their bloggers to provide some assistance on their junior coverage and I'm looking forward to it. Something tells me I may have covered my last Young junior match after his win today.
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