NEW YORK—The unspoken but palpable hope that a 15-year-old, coltish girl from northern California could emerge overnight to help lead U.S. tennis back into the land of milk and honey at a time when its leading lights have either been extinguished or are beginning to fade was gently put to rest Thursday night.
Zarina Diyas, a poker-faced 20-year-old from Kazakhstan, ended the Cinderella story being written about CiCi Bellis in a twilight U.S. Open clash on Court 17. The score in the savage, one-hour and 56-minute battle waged almost exclusively from either baseline was 6-3, 0-6, 6-2. A good time was had by all, including the teenager who created a sensation with her first-round upset of No. 12 seed Dominika Cibulkova.
“Unbelievable,” is the world Bellis used to describe the past few days. “This whole experience has been unbelievable, like mind-blowing. It's been crazy. It's been like the best couple days of my life.”
“Understandable,” was the word others used to describe a match in which the youngster tired visibly in the critical third set, even as Diyas subtly demonstrated the value of remaining resilient, pacing herself and remaining serene even as she battled Bellis—along with the emotional wave of support that helped carry the American wild card along through the first two sets.
Diyas held to open the match and promptly broke Bellis in the second game. The next three games were breaks as well, played in a manner that foreshadowed that this was to be a fierce and highly entertaining hitting contest, one that more than once made me think of those Rafael Nadal vs. Novak Djokovic tugs-of-war.
There were 24 break points in this match; that’s how close it was. (With 16, Diyas had twice as many break chances, although they each converted five.) This is what you get when the average first-serve speed of one player, Diyas, was 90 M.P.H., and that of the other a mere 85. That’s as good a template as you can ask if you’re looking to see a hitting contest.