Chile’s Nicolas Jarry battles to 100th win of career with victory over Wawrinka in Buenos Aires

Nicolas Jarry has battled past Stan Wawrinka in a blockbuster second-round match in Buenos Aires, 6-7 (3), 6-2, 7-6 (5), and with the victory comes a big milestone—it was the 100th tour-level win of his career.

He joins a very exclusive club, too: Jarry is just the eighth Chilean man in the Open Era to record 100 tour-level wins in his career.

CHILEAN MEN WITH 100+ CAREER WINS IN OPEN ERA (tour-level):
552: Jaime Fillol [552-390]
391: Marcelo Rios [391-192]
370: Fernando Gonzalez [370-202]
257: Nicolas Massu [257-238]
218: Hans Gildemeister [218-151]
159: Patricio Cornejo [159-220]
120: Cristian Garin [120-113]
100: Nicolas Jarry [100-90]

And the name at the top of the list is very familiar to Jarry—Jaime Fillol is his grandfather. Fillol actually gave Jarry his first tennis racquet and took him to tournaments like Wimbledon and the US Open as a kid.

Fillol is one of the most successful Chilean players in tennis history, winning eight career ATP titles, reaching a career-high ranking of No. 14 in 1974 and the quarterfinals of the US Open in 1975.

Fillol and Jarry, who reached a career-high of No. 18 earlier this year, are two of just seven Chileans to reach the Top 20 in ATP rankings history, along with five of the other names on the above list: Rios (career-high No. 1), Gonzalez (career-high No. 5), Massu (career-high No. 9), Gildemeister (career-high No. 12) and Garin (career-high No. 17).

Not only did Jarry have to battle back from a set down to reach his big milestone, but he was in all sorts of trouble in the decider, too.

Not only did Wawrinka sneak out an early break en route to a 3-1 lead in third set, but he held onto that break for most of the set, building leads of 4-2 and 5-3 as well, and even serving for the match at 5-4.

But Jarry broke at love to tie it at 5-all and eventually closed it out in a third set tie-break, sealing the victory on his fourth match point.

He was informed of the milestone in his on-court interview.

“It’s amazing, I didn’t know that,” he replied. “I’m very happy. It was a very tough match. I’m very happy with the way I stayed, competed, stayed focused. It means a lot, so I’m very happy for this.”

The No. 3-seeded Jarry will face No. 6-seeded Argentine Tomas Martin Etcheverry in the quarterfinals of the clay-court event on Friday.