By Bill Simons and John Huston
We love breakthroughs.
They feel so good.
But, these days in American tennis, 15 minutes of fame is about all we’re allowed.
Melanie Oudin, 17, mowed down four formidable foes here in 2009 and became a media darling. But she hasn’t sizzled on a singles court since.
Last year’s sensation, Haitian-born Vicky Duval, captured our imagination for a round, but now she’s battling Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
Certainly, this year’s phenom, the 15-year old sweet viper CiCi Bellis, would have her heady 15 minutes, then depart quite properly and go back to the practice courts to hone her skills.
Of course, New Yorkers—not to mention a hyped-up US media—hoped otherwise. They packed into the modest stands of Court 17 many hours ahead of time. Rarely had tennis seen such a buzz for a second-round match. And this match didn’t have a player who’d reached 21. Collectively, Bellis and Kazakhstan’s Zarina Diyas, 20, are just one year “older” than Venus Williams.
Neither youngster has cracked the top 40, although Diyas is quickly climbing up the ranks—currently No. 46, she’s risen over 200 spots since the beginning of last year. As for Bellis, her No. 1208 ranking going into the Open was just barely in the stratosphere.
Nonetheless, New York’s expectations were equally stratospheric.
After all, in her first-round win over No. 12 seed Dominika Cibulkova, Bellis unleashed a fierce-beyond-her-years ground attack to prevail over the struggling Aussie Open finalist. At the start of that match, she was the current pride of Northern California tennis. A few hours later, she was an American sensation.
Tonight, however, lacked a fairytale ending. Standing resolute in the face of overwhelming crowd support for Bellis, Diyas drew on her solid baseline game and plain but extremely high-percentage serve to score a 6-3, 0-6, 6-2 victory. She’s won 13 of 16 three-set matches this year, and she’ll now be making her third third-round Slam appearance of 2014 since coming through qualifying at the Australian Open. The US women of her age bracket might wish for such core consistency.
As for Bellis, her loss was still packed with promising signs. She dictated many of the rallies, displayed the more dynamic and versatile game, and unlike Duval in a similar scenario last year, she kept the match from slipping away in straights when the early momentum was seized by her more experienced opponent.
Against Cibulkova, Bellis had walked out on court and won the match’s first eight points before anyone could blink. Tonight, with the crowd chanting her name during changeovers while her father Gordon remained stoic (at daughter’s command) in the stands, she was noticeably jumpy—”nervous and tight” was how she described her first-set play later—and more verbally demonstrative. “That is just terrible tennis!” she exclaimed after one backhand miss early on.
Even Bellis’s seven-game run in the middle was much tougher than it looked, marked by long deuce games and numerous hard-hitting 15- and 20-plus-shot rallies. Toward the end of the third set, Bellis clutched her calf following one long point, and she seemed to turn her ankle during another.
Played in windy conditions, the battle wasn’t without its quirks, with Diyas frequently holding up her hand to ask Bellis to slow down her pace of play on serve, and the crowd sometimes whistling after Diyas caught her ball toss—ESPN even began counting the number of times she’d do it in a single game.
After the match, Bellis remained positive about her US Open experience. “What surprised me is that I could really stay with these pros,” she said, adding, “I think ranking really doesn’t matter. Anybody can beat anyone on any given day.”
Asked by Inside Tennis if she’s contemplated hoisting the US Open trophy, Bellis said, “I’d like to one day, but I’ll have to work a lot harder.” She didn’t flinch at being talked about as “the future of American tennis,” embracing the challenge.
Tonight, CiCi Bellis’s feet are back on the ground, and she’s switching her focus to the US Open girls tournament next week. “It’s definitely going to give me more confidence going into the juniors,” she said, sizing up her rollercoaster Slam debut.
When IT wondered what word Bellis would choose to describe her US Open experience, she didn’t hesitate: “Unbelievable.”
LUCIA HOFFMAN CONTRIBUTED TO THIS ARTICLE
