"The hardest part is trying to prove that you are good enough," says Stephens, once a teen breakthrough like Raducanu

INTERVIEW: Emma Raducanu, after defeating Sloane Stephens

Not a lot of players know what it's like to be under the kind of spotlight Emma Raducanu is right now, but the player she beat in the first round of the Australian Open, Sloane Stephens, is one of them.

Stephens won the 2017 US Open at 24, a surprise run that came four years before Raducanu's even-more-unlikely title run at Flushing Meadows as a teenage qualifier. But as Stephens notes, there's a lot more pressure on the 19-year-old from Britain.

"I think she is carrying a whole country and that's quite different than my win at the US Open," Stephens told press at the Australian Open. "Her game style and her, how young she is, like she is a little bit of a different dynamic than I had, but I think she definitely is just going to have to learn to manage it and figure out what works best for her.

"Because she is so young it's definitely a long road, so there's going to be a lot of ups and downs and has just a lot to learn. Obviously, on the tour and not played that many tournaments on tour, it's definitely a learning experience and a learning curve."

The 28-year-old Stephens recalled her breakthrough season, when she reached the semifinals of the 2013 Australian Open at 19, upsetting Serena Williams before losing to Victoria Azarenka in a contest that featured controversy around the Belarusian's break in play for breathing problems.

"Very different. I was new on tour also then also and I got molly-whopped by Vika in the semis," she said. "Very interesting match there. A lot to learn. I mean, [Raducanu] hasn't been through much of anything yet, so there will be some definitely some ups and downs and some crazy experiences that happen throughout her years. This is only the beginning."

From there, Stephens also reached the 2018 French Open finals and won the Miami Open; currently, though, she is No. 67 in the rankings. Raducanu is No. 18.

Backing up a big win can be difficult, Stephens added, especially at the start of a player's career—but experience helps.

''I think the hardest part is trying to prove that you are good enough to be where you are, or good enough to stay where you are or how you got there. The more you try to do that I think the more emotion shows and the more things probably out of character that you normally would do, because you're trying so hard to show and prove that you're this person or this ranking," she said. "I was talking to someone in the locker room and I'm like, 'We'll be here when she comes down'—but not Emma, but just in general."