He came, he buzz-sawed a lot of fierce forehands, and he conquered. When it was over, Juan Martin del Potro had polished off a fantastically played, wonderfully dramatic semifinal match at the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro. His foe on this day was Rafael Nadal, already a men's doubles gold medalist in Rio, albeit one who spent a lot of hours on court—19 in one week, to be exact. (And that was the stat even before this semifinal bout was over.)
Make no mistake, del Potro deserved every ounce of joy and adoration he bathed in upon completing his 5-7, 6-4, 7-6 (5) takedown of Nadal. The wrist injuries between these two would've felled lesser men, sent them packing forever from such a sport that demands so much, gives and takes so much from the players on its stage. Lest I rhapsodize further, let's come up for air, shall we, and salute the grand match that was with—what else?—a sampling of the best words and photos, GIFs and videos, that Twitter could muster during this match.