Coco Gauff begins title defense with easy win – Daily News

By HOWARD FENDRICH AP Tennis Writer

NEW YORK — The chant rang out in cavernous Arthur Ashe Stadium on Monday at the U.S. Open before Coco Gauff’s first service game of her first match of her first Grand Slam tournament as a defending champion: “Here we go, Coco! Here we go!”

Coming to Flushing Meadows off a series of early exits at other events, Gauff already was down 1-0 to Varvara Gracheva, having dropped the match’s initial game at love by making four groundstroke errors. What followed was a tough, tight game, featuring 14 points across eight minutes and three break chances for Gracheva.

The important part, of course, was that Gauff saved all of those break points, claimed that game, and suddenly was in complete control on the way to a 6-2, 6-0 victory that not only put the 20-year-old American in the second round but also told her – and everyone else – that her game is in better shape than it appeared lately.

“The last couple of weeks were tough, and I was like, ‘I have to do this and do that, but I don’t have to prove anything to anyone except myself.’ So … (these) two weeks are just about proving all the expectations that I have on myself,” the third-seeded Gauff said. “I have many more years coming back here and I’m not going to win every year. Just that perspective and just having the belief that I can – but not the expectation that I should.”

Day 1 at the year’s last Grand Slam tournament went about as well as possible for Gauff and another young American featured in Ashe, 13th-seeded Ben Shelton, a semifinalist a year ago who beat 2020 champion Dominic Thiem, 6-4, 6-2, 6-2. It was the last U.S. Open match for Thiem, who turns 31 next week and is retiring after this season.

“Obviously she plays with a lot of passion,” Shelton, 21, said about Gauff. “You could tell that she cares out there. She’s into it every time that she’s on the court. I think that’s something that the people love.”

Former U.S. Open champion Sloane Stephens was eliminated after a stunning first-round collapse. The 2017 champion won the first nine games against Clara Burel of France before falling, 0-6, 7-5, 7-5, on Monday night, the second year in a row she has lost in the opening round.

Stephens got the first night match on Arthur Ashe Stadium and it appeared she would end it quickly. The American won the first set in 21 minutes, then went up 3-0 in the second after breaking Burel the first two times she served.

Burel then broke in the next game, standing behind the baseline and breathing a long sigh of relief after finally get on the board. She broke again when Stephens was serving the match with a 5-4 lead, and again to win the second set.

Stephens again had a 5-4 lead and served for the match in the third set, but again Burel broke to start a streak of three straight games that gave her the match.

Gauff and Stephens were not the only past U.S. Open champs on Monday’s schedule: Novak Djokovic – whose collection of 24 Slam titles includes last year’s in New York – was facing Radu Albot at night.

Seeded women’s winners included No. 7 Zheng Qinwen, the women’s gold medalist at the Paris Olympics earlier this month; No. 24 Donna Vekic, the silver medalist; No. 12 Daria Kasatkina; and No. 14 Madison Keys.

No. 9 Maria Sakkari stopped playing after one set because of an injured right shoulder. The highest-seeded man out of the bracket during the day session was No. 15 Holger Rune, who was eliminated by Brandon Nakashima of the U.S., 6-2, 6-1, 6-4.

Among the men’s seeds advancing were No. 4 Alexander Zverev, the runner-up to Thiem four years ago; No. 6 Andrey Rublev; No. 8 Casper Ruud, the 2022 runner-up at Flushing Meadows; No. 9 Grigor Dimitrov; and No. 12 Taylor Fritz.

Zheng is enjoying a breakthrough season that began with a run to the final at the Australian Open in January and reached a peak when she claimed China’s first Summer Games singles gold. Monday was difficult at the outset against 2019 French Open semifinalist Amanda Anisimova, but Zheng eventually came back to win, 4-6, 6-4, 6-2.

“Everything starts at zero. You are not anymore the Olympic champion,” Zheng said. “Just be humble and try to work, fight every single match, because if you don’t fight, you have a big chance to lose.”

That mirrors Gauff’s approach as she returns to the site of her greatest triumph so far.

If she was trying to start from scratch after early exits in three events at the Paris Games – not that she wants to forget about that trip to France; Gauff wore a necklace with the Olympic rings during Monday’s match – followed by a two-match skid on North American hard courts, Gauff did a good job of it.

This wasn’t surprising to Gauff. Not at all. She knew she didn’t play great in Toronto or Cincinnati in recent weeks. But she also could tell she was hitting balls well in practice.

“Usually that first round for me can sometimes set the tone for a tournament, whether you’re playing well or not. … I had a good mentality. Is this going to say I’m going to play great the next couple matches? Yes or no,” Gauff said. “But I think the mentality I have going into this week will be there, and hopefully the execution stays there.”

She only needed 66 minutes to win Monday, using some of her 10 aces to help erase all eight break points Gracheva accumulated, and compiling a 16-5 edge in winners.

“From the start, we kind of all knew that Coco was going to be an amazing player, and she’s incredibly mature and carries herself in a way that I wish that I carried myself when I was her age,” said Keys, 29, who lost to Stephens in the U.S. Open final seven years ago. “It’s also very impressive how she’s been able … through all of the pressure and all of the expectation that’s been put on her, continue to do as well as she has.”

THIEM GETS SEND-OFF 4 YEARS AFTER TITLE

Thiem never heard the unmistakable sounds of the New York crowd when he won the U.S. Open for his lone Grand Slam title.

Arthur Ashe Stadium was nearly empty for his historic comeback on that 2020 night, the COVID-19 pandemic forcing the tournament to be played without fans.

So even though his Grand Slam career ended Monday with his first-round loss to Shelton, Thiem said the match was an important moment for him, allowing him to play before a packed house on the court where he had the biggest victory of his career.

“To say thank you to all of you,” Thiem told the fans, “and to make the time up for what we missed four years ago.”

Thiem, who will turn 31 next week, has battled wrist injuries in recent years and had previously announced this would be his final season. He was given a wild card by the U.S. Tennis Association into the tournament for what became just his 10th match of the season.

Thiem beat Alexander Zverev in the 2020 final, winning a fifth-set tiebreaker to become the first man to win the U.S. Open after losing the first two sets since 1949. That was already Thiem’s fourth Grand Slam final and there was no reason to think there wouldn’t be more.

The Austrian had reached No. 3 in the ATP rankings that March after getting to the Australian Open final, and the year ended with him inside the top 10 for a fifth straight season. He made two French Open finals before that.

But Thiem injured his right wrist in June 2021 and he could never regain the form or the strength on his forehand that had allowed him to go 9-3 against the Big Three of Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal during the 2019 and 2020 seasons.

The forehand, Thiem said, “never came back like it was before.”

He certainly lacks the power of Shelton, who rode his explosive left-handed serve all the way to the 2023 U.S. Open semifinals – which followed a second-round victory over Thiem.

They shared a nice exchange at the net before Shelton encouraged to the crowd to show its appreciation for Thiem.

“Obviously I have been out here a couple years now, and he’s kind of been in and out playing tournaments and not playing tournaments,” Shelton said. “So you hate to see a guy like that, such a nice guy, great player, go through the injuries and deal with all that he’s dealt with.

“But I think if I learn anything from him, it’s that this is a game that is unforgiving. Things can change quick. You can be at the top of the game, and your body doesn’t hold up or some freak accident happens. Injuries happen all the time. So tennis isn’t forever. I think that’s one thing to learn and take away. Obviously still had a career that a lot of people dream about.”

Thiem was presented with a framed collage of photos of himself in action at the U.S. Open.

He said he will play two more events before retiring, ending his career at the ATP’s stop in Vienna in October. Thiem said he will stay involved somehow in tennis, and already has an academy in Austria. And though he said he’s at peace with his plan to retire, he knows there’s a part of tennis he won’t be able to replace.

“The thing I will miss the most is, like, this feeling after winning a great match. It’s not really comparable to anything else,” Thiem said. “You don’t really get this feeling, I mean, in my case, in life outside of tennis, because it’s a real high. It’s like being on drugs a little bit, I guess.

“I mean, I know that probably this feeling is not coming back again, so this is for sure also the one I’m going to miss the most.”

JOVIC, 16, WINS OPENER

Iva Jovic, a 16-year-old from Torrance, eliminated 2023 Australian Open semifinalist Magda Linette of Poland, 6-4, 6-3.

“Surprised, but not surprised,” Jovic said about the result against someone who has been ranked in the top 20.

“I just had a plan about what I was going to do before we started, and there weren’t that many needs for crazy adjustments, because it was going well,” Jovic said. “So just kind of sticking to that.”

Katrina Scott of the U.S. was 16 when she won a match at the U.S. Open four years ago. Last year, Mirra Andreeva of Russia was 16 when she did it.

Here’s one indication of Jovic’s youth: She still is planning to enter the junior event later in the tournament. Here’s another: Jovic is still in school, taking online courses through a program she described as “convenient and … very lenient.”

Jovic grew up participating in a bunch of sports, including soccer, gymnastics and swimming. But she gravitated to tennis, which she began learning alongside her older sister on courts built atop the apartment complex they lived in.

“I want to be the best that I can be,” Jovic said. “Just get better every day, honestly. Just keep working. I’m on a good path, but there’s a lot more to do.”

She earned a wild-card entry for the main bracket at the year’s last Grand Slam tournament by winning the U.S. Tennis Association Girls’ 18s national championship. She also paired with Tyra Grant there to take the doubles title, which gave them a wild card for women’s doubles at Flushing Meadows; the USTA granted Jovic and another American teen, Kaylan Bigun, a spot in the mixed doubles field, too.

Jovic and Grant teamed up to win junior doubles titles at the Australian Open in January and Wimbledon in July; they also were the runners-up at the French Open in June.

Jovic’s favorite players are 24-time Grand Slam champion Novak Djokovic – he’s Serbian, and so are her roots; after the English portion of her news conference concluded Monday, she answered questions in Serbian – and Tokyo Olympics gold medalist Belinda Bencic.

Why?

“Djokovic, I mean, do I need to say? We all know how great he is,” Jovic responded. “And then Belinda, she just takes the ball so early and her footwork is very cutting the angle, so she just makes her opponents feel kind of suffocated. That’s what I would like to try to do.”

Jovic would love the chance to have a conversation with Djokovic, but their lone interaction so far was when she asked if he would mind posing for a photo.

“I do have a selfie,” she said with a smile. “It doesn’t look great, but it’s there.”

FANS NOW ALLOWED TO MOVE AROUND STANDS

Imagine if fans at a Major League Baseball game were told they needed to wait until the end of an inning to go grab a beer and a hot dog. Or if folks at an NFL or NBA game weren’t supposed to head to the restroom until after a quarter finished. Would never happen, right?

That, though, is essentially what etiquette long has demanded at tennis matches, particularly at Grand Slam tournaments such as the U.S. Open, which started Monday: No one gets in or out during a game. Indeed, not even between games, sometimes. At the start of a set, for example, everyone has been required to hang on until the first changeover, which arrives after three games.

Not anymore at Flushing Meadows. Under a new policy instituted this year, people with tickets for certain sections at every court – from 23,859-capacity Arthur Ashe Stadium all the way down to 336-seat Courts No. 8 and 16 – can move around whenever they want, even during play. And there’s no more twiddling thumbs as multiple games go by before entering or exiting; that’s now permitted after every game.

Spectators seemed to love it on Day 1; might take some players a bit to get used to this, which also was tried at the Australian Open in January.

“I noticed it, but once the point starts, I don’t notice it. I guess with college tennis I’ve played … there’s a lot of situations where I’ve been in that’s a lot crazier than a couple of people walking with drinks back to their seat – Honey Deuces,” said Shelton, referring to the signature cocktail the tournament peddles for $23 a piece.

“I don’t really mind it,” added Shelton, the 2022 NCAA champion for Florida, who won on Ashe on Monday. “I’m sure some players will be annoyed with it this week.”

Most players asked Monday, including Gauff, echoed Olympic silver medalist Donna Vekic’s take: “Doesn’t really bother me that much.”

There are, after all, distractions aplenty at the noisiest Slam, from rowdy late-night crowds to airplanes zooming overhead to the clatter of nearby trains.

U.S. Open tournament referee Jake Garner acknowledged this could “take some getting used to, from the players’ point of view,” because they’ll consider it bothersome. On the other hand, Garner said in an interview, “It might be seen as a radical thing for tennis, but I’m not sure trying to increase the fan experience and making it more enjoyable for them should be that radical.”

During several matches around the grounds on Day 1 of the two-week event, competition generally continued without a hitch as ticketholders wandered up and down staircases, ambled along walkways or just generally milled about. Occasionally, a player who was supposed to serve paused a little extra before starting a point or a returner held up a hand asking for more time.

One thing missing: The usual admonitions from chair umpires about “Find your seats quickly, please!”

Rachel Ferman Halkias, who works at YouTube and has made more than a half-dozen visits to the U.S. Open, was pleased when an usher let her in after the second set’s first game of 12th-seeded Daria Kasatkina’s victory at Court No. 7.

“I was kind of prepared to wait longer, but I like this. Otherwise, I would have been standing on the stairs for who knows how long? As long as it doesn’t disturb the players, it’s a good thing,” she said. “I’m OK with all the rules tennis has, but let’s evolve.”

Kasatkina said the issue is when there’s movement behind the baselines; it’s not a big deal when people shift along the court’s sides.

“It’s tough to compare with other sports, because tennis is one against one, and you’re very focused. With team sports, there can be 10 or 20 players moving all the time. Also with team sports, it’s loud from the beginning to the end and you get used to the noise when it’s constant. When you’re playing in silence and then just some noise comes from somewhere,” she said, snapping her fingers, “you notice it.”

Lisa and Ferenc Miskolczi, a married couple from New Jersey watching at Louis Armstrong Stadium, appreciate the different rules.