The Top Matches of 2016, No. 4: Puig d. Kerber (Summer Olympics)

The gold-medal match in women’s singles at the Rio Olympics wasn’t about the contest as much as it was the performance. Specifically, the winner’s performance. Unseeded Monica Puig, who was ranked 34th at the time and who had fought tooth and nail just to qualify for the Games, won the first gold in any sport for Puerto Rico. From the beginning of the year, the 22-year-old had dedicated herself to representing the tiny island nation where she was born. When she finally got a chance to do it, she rose to the occasion in a way that no one could have anticipated. Puig beat three Grand Slam champions—Garbiñe Muguruza, Petra Kvitova and Angelique Kerber—on her golden run. It was the only tournament she would win all year.

We all remember how Puig played in beating Kerber, 6-4, 4-6, 6-1, in the final. Looking at the highlights above, though, I was a little surprised to see how entertaining the rallies were, and how hard-fought the match was right down to the long, nerve-racking, back-and-forth final game. Kerber, who would ascend to No. 1 the next month, surely believed she was going to win. But there was no shame in the way she played, or in losing to this opponent on this day. As the video below shows, Puig’s win reverberated—literally—in a way that tennis matches rarely do. She really did have all of Puerto Rico behind her. “Sí, se puede,” her fans chanted in Rio—”Yes we can”—and Puig proved them right.

—It’s obvious from the first point we see in this clip that Puig is seeing the ball extremely well. She’s forced to stretch for a decent wide serve, but she still reaches out and drills the ball back with too much pace for Kerber to handle. Paul Annacone likes to talk about “hitting aggressive shots to conservative targets”; over and over in this match, Puig showed us what that means and why it works.

—Puig never plays it safe, but she also doesn’t take wild risks. She hits the ball early and to specific spots, focuses on depth as much as pace and builds points rather than going for outright winners right away. Even her service motion is more self-assured than normal.

But it’s Puig’s backhand that’s the difference-maker. It may have been the most devastating weapon wielded by any player, in any match, in 2016. She put her backhand returns at Kerber’s feet; moved her from side to side with it; hit winners crosscourt and down the line that left Kerber staring at her coach in disbelief; and came under it for drop-shot winners, just for good measure.

—In that sense, Puig exposed what will likely always be a vulnerability of Kerber’s, even now that she’s No. 1. The German can do a lot of things, but she can’t take the racquet out of her opponent’s hands. If an opponent is determined to attack her, and is connecting the way Puig is here, Kerber can be beaten.

In the past, faced with this kind of onslaught, Kerber might have drowned in a sea of sarcastic anger; and she does give Puig an ironic racquet clap after one of her more spectacular winners. But Kerber also battles back, and the rallies get more intense in the second set. At the end of one of the best of them, Kerber puts a forehand volley into the net and is broken for 4-4. She collapses, and the crowd goes berserk; the match seems to be all but over. But Kerber breaks right back and holds for the second set.

—In the third, though, it’s all Puig again; there’s no stopping her. She runs out to a 5-0 lead, and after going down 0-40 at 5-1, she comes back to hold for the gold. Judging by the clip above, Puig’s level never really drops. She never gets tentative or shows much in the way of nerves. To break for 5-0, she wins a point after hitting a full-stretch volley that lands on the baseline. If Kerber had broken for 5-2, would things have turned around? How much longer could Puig have kept that level up? Fortunately for her, and the citizens of Puerto Rico, we’ll never have to know.

—Kerber’s chilly handshake was criticized, and perhaps rightly. It wasn’t a shining example of the Olympic spirit. But she smiled on the medal stand, and by the next day she sounded proud to own a silver medal.

As for Puig, her win felt like destiny. Maybe, for this longtime Miami resident, Puerto Rico was an ideal as much as a place; a part of her that was lost that she wanted to gain back.

“I know the country really appreciates this,” Puig said, “and I really wanted to give this victory to them. And the way I did it tonight, I wouldn’t want it any other way.”

“...I’ve always been 100 percent loyal. I still have family in Puerto Rico, and I’ve gone back quite a lot ...That island has given me so much, so much love and support throughout my whole career, and I just owe this to them.”

After Rio, Puig fell back to earth. She went 4-5 the rest of the season and lost to three women ranked outside the Top 50. But the fact that she couldn’t come close to repeating her Olympian performance only makes this moment more magical.