No better time than now, and no better tournament than the US Open, for the streak of futility to end. It was true before the tournament started. It\u2019s even truer now.<\/p>\n
American men, the ball is in your court.<\/p>\n
\u201cOf all the men\u2019s majors, this is the one that\u2019s most wide open for the Americans. A big opportunity for sure,\u201d ESPN analyst Mary Joe Fernandez said prior to the tournament\u2019s start.<\/p>\n
There was plenty to back her claim then, and there\u2019s even more, with the tournament hitting its midpoint this weekend, to believe in now. The changing of the tennis guard has been underway for years, reflected in the finality of Federer\u2019s enshrinement, the more recent retirement of fellow Big Three warrior Rafael Nadal, and most recently, the first-round Open loss by the third member of their GOAT club, Novak Djokovic. <\/p>\n
But the dominos don\u2019t stop there. World No. 1 Jannik Sinner is absent from the tournament with a knee injury. That moved Alexander Zverev to the top seed, but he made history in becoming the first No. 1 to need five sets to win his first two matches, no doubt tiring himself out in the process. Second seed Carlos Alcaraz, the defending champion, would be the clear favorite if not for playing for the first time in five months thanks to a long battle with a wrist injury. Third seed Felix Auger-Aliassime was bounced in the second round.<\/p>\n
The field is wide open.<\/p>\n
No wonder the USTA was quick to send out a press release touting the 15 American men who advanced to the third round, the most since that same number in 2002. By odds alone, a US champion looks like it might finally happen. The 18 men in the draw is six more than the next closest country, France, and the 14 American men in the world Top 100 is also the most of any country, with six in the top 25. Six of the top 20 seeds in this tournament are American: Ben Shelton (No. 8), Taylor Fritz (9), Frances Tiafoe (11), Learner Tien (14), Brandon Nakashima (16), and Tommy Paul (20). Heading into play Saturday, only Nakashima had lost.<\/p>\n
Fritz, who dropped only nine games in his first two rounds, is the last American man to reach a major final, losing the 2024 Open to Sinner. Shelton, a two-time NCAA champion at Florida and winner of titles this summer in Dallas, Munich, Stuttgart, and Montreal, is into the second week after surviving an overnight win Friday. Perennial crowd favorite Tiafoe, who attended the event as a kid, rallied from two sets down in his opening round and didn\u2019t lose another set on his way to the fourth round. Paul is already there. <\/p>\n
\u201cI think obviously it\u2019s a good opportunity for the Americans,\u201d Fritz said, \u201cnot because the draw is opening. I think just because there\u2019s a lot of guys that are at that level and can play at that level.\u201d<\/p>\n
But, as Tiafoe warned, they\u2019re not thinking about it, not yet anyway. As he said, \u201cIt\u2019s the same conversation. You still [have to] beat seven guys, however way you slice it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Among individual sports challenges, winning a tennis major ranks as one of the toughest, demanding both physical and mental stamina. In the 20th century, US men dominated that effort, from early legends like Bill Tilden, Don Budge, and Stan Smith, through the life of the legendary Ashe, onto the Jimmy Connors and McEnroe era, and then the golden generation of Pete Sampras, Agassi, Jim Courier, and Michael Chang, which was followed by Roddick and James Blake.<\/p>\n
But the bottom was falling out. As a breakdown on the US Open site pointed out<\/a>, by 2011, no American men were in the Top 10 when Mardy Fish fell out, the first time in the history of the ATP rankings that happened. In 2021, 10 years later, there was no American man in the Top 30, also a first.<\/p>\n Grand Slams remain elusive, but eventually, the efforts to restock the rankings worked, and to a wonderfully collaborative degree. Paul recently celebrated his marriage to Paige Lorenze, and there amid the festivities were his best man, Reilly Opelka (ranked No. 153 in the world), and groomsmen Fritz and Tiafoe. The quartet<\/a> grew up in the USTA\u2019s development program.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s just a good time when all of us get to spend time together, not in a tennis environment, which also is kind of rare,\u201d Fritz said. \u201cIt\u2019s great to just be around guys I\u2019ve known for close to 15 years. We\u2019re all really close, and yeah, I\u2019d consider a lot of those guys my absolute closest friends.\u201d<\/p>\n Together, for sure. But it\u2019s more than time for one of them to break out on the court and win a major.<\/p>\n Tara Sullivan is a Globe columnist. She can be reached at tara.sullivan@globe.com<\/a>. Follow her @Globe_Tara<\/a>.<\/p>\n