Amanda Anisimova lets emotions boil up, then rides them in Miami to snap Mirra Andreeva's hot streak

When Amanda Anisinova stepped up to serve at 4-3 in the third set against Mirra Andreeva in Miami on Sunday night, it felt like she was stepping up to a career crossroads as well. Did the former teen prodigy have what it takes to beat the teen prodigy of the moment? Victory was within her grasp. She just needed, as her coach told her more than once, to “be brave” enough to grab it.

Andreeva was on a 13-match win streak that had taken her to back-to-back WTA 1000 titles in Dubai and Indian Wells, and made her the talk of the sport. On this night, though, the 17-year-old started the match struggling to breathe because of pain in her stomach, and looking as if she wanted to be anywhere other than Hard Rock Stadium. Her coach, Conchita Martinez, assured her that “it’s gonna pass.” The words may have made Andreeva more willing to keep playing, but they didn’t seem to make her any happier about it.

Exclusive: Coach Conchita Martinez keeps Andreeva grounded

Rather than giving an advantage to Anisimova, though, Andreeva’s issues robbed the match of any flow. Unforced errors sprayed from both players’ racquets—there would be 110 of them combined on the evening—and break points were squandered as quickly as they were earned. Andreeva slammed her racquet down after her misses, while Anisimova looked up at the sky in disbelief after hers.

At 4-4, their shots began to click and the rallies sharpened. Anisimova settled in as the attacker and Andreeva as the defender, and they proceeded to a tiebreaker. Once there, it was Anisimova who elevated when it mattered. From 4-3 in the breaker, she forced an error with a forehand, smacked a service winner, and closed the set with a forehand winner.

“Of course it wasn’t ideal, I think it broke the rhythm of the match a little bit, because we had just started,” Anisimova said of Andreeva’s physio visits. “I was trying to pick up my rhythm after that. I was happy with the way I was able to fight and stay focused.”

But Andreeva had won too many matches in a row to call it quits that easily. She may be been physically uncomfortable, but mentally she had the confidence of someone who hasn’t lost in more than a month. She began to dip into her full repertoire of drops, slices, lobs, moonballs, and winning topspin drives to the corners. When Anisimova failed to put an easy pair of shots away while serving at 2-3, the match turned and Andreeva ran away with the second set.

Even then, though, Andreeva never settled down or seemed calm. After failing to convert a break point early in the third set, she pounded a ball into a side wall and was quietly cautioned by the chair umpire. One game later, she was broken, and one game after that, she failed to convert another break point. By then, she was simmering.

With Andreeva serving at 1-3, Anisimova called for a trainer for a blister; that’s not normally done in the middle of a game, but it’s allowed for an immediate issue. Andreeva, not surprisingly, didn’t see it that way.

🎥 "I can if it's acute": Anisimova justifies mid-game MTO to Andreeva

“We all know why,” Andreeva said to the chair umpire, implying that Anisimova was trying to break her rhythm.

“My skin broke on my finger," Anisimova explained afterward. "When you get an acute injury you’re allowed to take a timeout, so that’s what I did."

Anisimova has never been a confrontational player, but when she won the next point, she reacted with a rare fist-pump. Now the question was whether she could ride her newly contentious energy to a win.

She started with a good hold from 15-30 down, to make it 4-2. But she couldn’t break from 15-30 up on Andreeva’s next service game. That left her serving at 4-3, 15-15.

For most of the match, Anisimova had been reluctant to follow her penetrating ground strokes forward, instead taking Andreeva’s towering lobs off the bounce. This time, she stepped in and closed with a confident swing-volley winner. Two minutes later, she was up 5-3. Three minutes after that, she had snapped Andreeva’s streak with a satisfying 7-6 (5), 2-6, 6-3 win.

“We’re both big hitters, I knew we would go and have a great match out here,” said Anisimova, who was playing in Miami’s main stadium for the first time. “She has a lot of variety in her game, definitely a tricky opponent.”

Anisimova’s reward is match with the woman who beat her at the Australian Open, Emma Raducanu, on Monday afternoon. We’ll see what she can take from her streak-snapping win over Andreeva. This time, Anisimova let her emotions boil up, and transform her into a more aggressive and purposeful player. It shouldn’t be the last time.