Taylor Fritz played the match of his life to fight back and stun World No. 7 Marin Cilic 4-6, 7-5, 6-4 at the BNP Paribas Open on Sunday. It was the first Top 10 victory for the 2016 ATP Star of Tomorrow presented by Emirates.

“Just the whole experience with the crowd, how I came back in the match, words can’t describe it, really,” said Fritz.

Late-night matches in Indian Wells are a special treat for not only the spectators, but the players as well. In the shadow of the San Jacinto Mountains, Stadium 3 was abuzz with excitement on a warm evening in the California desert. Chants of ‘Taylor! Taylor!’ rang out as fans shuffled over from witnessing fellow American Jack Sock defeat Henri Laaksonen on the adjacent Stadium 2.      

As the clock struck 10pm, the last match of the second round finally reached its conclusion. Cilic was in cruise control from the first ball, surging to a set and a break lead. But Fritz stormed back, drawing level at a set apiece and grinding again from a break deficit in the decider.

With friends and family in attendance, forehands exploded off the California native’s racquet and he would serve for the match at 5-3. Cilic would break back, but Fritz had the last word, breaking for the match in the very next game. He would survive after just over two hours, reaching the third round at an ATP World Tour Masters 1000 event for the first time.

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“It was amazing, especially with all the crowd support,” Fritz added. “And just being at this tournament, my whole family was there. [My wife] Raquel was going crazy. It was amazing.

“I started off definitely slow. I thought I was going to get bageled in that first set. Then I was just making a lot of balls… I thought the main thing today was how I returned serve. Also, I thought I did a pretty good job of competing and just sticking in the match and staying solid.

“Instead of getting really down on myself, I just told myself, ‘You know what? At least I put myself in that opportunity to serve out the match’. I thought I had been doing a really good job of returning his serve, so I thought there was a chance I could break back. And especially after I lost my serve, I said, ‘Oh, now I really, really don’t want to lose this match.’ I would be thinking about it for the next week about how I choked.”

It was a big win for Fritz, who is looking to regain his top form after falling out of the Top 100 of the Emirates ATP Rankings just a month ago. The #NextGenATP star showed why he is considered one of the bright rising talents on the ATP World Tour, becoming the first teenager to defeat a Top 10 player this year.

With significant points up for grabs in the Emirates ATP Race To Milan, Fritz puts himself in strong position after reaching the third round at the first ATP World Tour Masters 1000 event of the year.

“If I am going to be totally honest, I check it a lot,” Fritz said, referring to the Emirates ATP Race To Milan standings. “I do want to be there. It’s something I feel like would be a huge honour to be there, because there’s so many new people that came up at the end of last year and this year in the whole the NextGen campaign. So many new, amazing players that just make the Race so much tougher.

“I think it would be really cool to be in it the first year. I’m just working really hard. I do check it a lot. I’m definitely looking at it. This result is helping me a lot for Milan.”

Fritz will face Tunisia’s Malek Jaziri on Tuesday, with a coveted spot in the Round of 16 on the line.

•    Third round action in the top half of the draw at the BNP Paribas Open on Monday is headlined by No. 3 seed Stan Wawrinka, No. 8 Dominic Thiem, No. 10 Gael Monfils and No. 11 David Goffin. They are the highest seeds of the 12 remaining in the top half of the draw.

•    In the first men’s match on Stadium 1, No. 29 seed Mischa Zverev looks for his second win against Thiem. Zverev won the previous meeting on grass 76 62 in the 1R of Stuttgart in June 2015. The 29-year-old German is trying to earn his seventh career Top 10 win (6-13) and second this season. He beat No. 1 Andy Murray in the 4R at the Australian Open in January. Thiem, who is 9-3 against Germans since the beginning of last year, is attempting to reach the 4R in Indian Wells for the second straight year.

•    In the next men’s match on Stadium 1, Wawrinka brings a 4-0 head-to-head record against No. 28 seed Philipp Kohlschreiber, who is coming off his 400th career match win on Saturday (vs. Dolgopolov-ret.). Wawrinka is trying to snap a three-match losing streak against Germans going back to last year. Wawrinka is a two-time quarter-finalist (2008, 2011) in Indian Wells and one of two players (No. 13 Berdych) in the top half of the draw who has won an ATP Masters 1000 title.

•    In the last match of the night session, Monfils and No. 20 John Isner square off for the ninth time (tied 4-4). Isner has a 13-12 lead in sets. This is their first meeting since 2014 ATP Masters 1000  Paris where Monfils won 64 76. They played here in the 2R in 2009 and Isner won 67 61 64. Monfils reached the quarter-finals here last year, his best result, while Isner advanced to the final in 2012 (l. to Federer). He is the only player left in the top half of the draw who is a former finalist here.

•    On Stadium 2, second round doubles action features three of the top six singles players with No. 1 Andy Murray (w/Evans), No. 2 Novak Djokovic (w/Troicki) and No. 6 Rafael Nadal (w/Tomic). The lone singles match is under the lights between No. 27 Pablo Cuevas and Fabio Fognini, who has won three of the previous four ATP World Tour level meetings.

•    On Stadium 3, Japanese lucky loser Yoshihito Nishioka takes on No. 13 Berdych, who won the previous meeting, and Goffin plays No. 22 Albert Ramos-Vinolas for the first time. On Stadium 4, No. 21 Pablo Carreno Busta meets No. 16 countryman Roberto Bautista Agut (tied 1-1), and qualifiers Vasek Pospisil and Dusan Lajovic battle for the second time (Pospisil leads 1-0).

•    THIRD ROUND REMAINING BY COUNTRY: There are 18 countries represented in the third round, leading with Spain and the U.S. with five players each, followed by Germany (3), France, Japan, Serbia and Switzerland (2 each).    

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Watch your favourite players work on their games by taking in a live stream at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells.

When the BNP Paribas Open draw was released on Wednesday, jaws plummeted to the floor at the sight of the star power in the bottom quarter.

Novak Djokovic could set a rematch against Juan Martin del Potro in the third round and Roger Federer has longtime rival Rafael Nadal in his sights in the fourth round. But perhaps the most intriguing match-up is the under-the-radar clash between Nick Kyrgios and Alexander Zverev, set for Tuesday in Indian Wells.

Youth will be served when the two youngest players in the Top 20 of the Emirates ATP Rankings lock horns for the first time at the professional level. Kyrgios took their lone encounter in the juniors 6-3, 6-1 on the grass of Roehampton, England, in 2013.

“I’m looking forward to it,” said Kyrgios. “We have been obviously close mates for a long time. I played juniors with him. I played him once in juniors and I thought he had a big game then. He’s obviously put it together now. He’s had some great results and beaten some big names.

“I know it’s going to be tough, especially on this surface. If he plays his aggressive game, it’s not going to be easy to get looks on his serve, and it’s the same for me. If I go out there and play my style of tennis and I lose, I won’t be surprised. But if I win, I won’t be surprised as well.”

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Brash bashers from the baseline, 21-year-old Kyrgios and 19-year-old Zverev are two of the hottest rising talents on the ATP World Tour, soaring up the Emirates ATP Rankings to the Top 20 in the past year. Both players exude confident and stong personalities on and off the court and are fast becoming fan favourites. It is undoubtedly their first of many FedEx ATP Head2Head encounters, with their career trajectories pointing skyward.

“I will be very excited, because I think we are the two young guys talked about the most, with Dominic Thiem,” Zverev said to the assembled media at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden on Sunday. “It will be a very exciting match, because he’s played well this year and I’ve played well this year too. We’ll see.”

Kyrgios, seeded 15th, opened his BNP Paribas Open campaign with a 6-3, 6-4 victory over Horacio Zeballos on Sunday afternoon, while 18th-seed Zverev kicked off his bid with a win over another Argentine, downing Facundo Bagnis 7-6(10), 6-3.

Following a breakout run to the fourth round last year, Zverev is hungry to go one step further. The German came up just short to Rafael Nadal in a three-set thriller, falling despite holding a match point. He was one missed volley from becoming the youngest quarter-finalist in Indian Wells since Michael Chang and Andre Agassi in 1989.

“I don’t want to say I can be the champion by the end of the next week, but I feel I can play great tennis and I can beat anybody,” Zverev added. “I have the toughest quarter of the draw and I have a feeling the champion will come out of this section. The next few rounds will be very, very difficult for all us.”

With a Round of 16 blockbuster against either Djokovic or Del Potro at stake, expect plenty of fireworks on Tuesday in the southern California desert.

Roger Federer wasted no time in booking his spot in the third round of the BNP Paribas Open on Sunday evening. In a battle of veteran players on the ATP World Tour, 35-year-old Federer raced past 36-year-old Stephane Robert 6-2, 6-1 in just 51 minutes.

“Very happy. The knee is a thing of the past, which is great. I don’t even have to think or talk about it. So I thought the match went really well,” said Federer. “I’m very pleased with how it went. And moving on to the next round, it’s going to be a different matchup, so I’ve got to adjust again.”

Despite the scoreline, Federer was full of praise for Robert playing some of the best tennis of his career at age 36. 

“I admire those guys who make the breakthrough later on and find a way and not lose love for the game early,” said Federer. “It’s nice to see him do well now and beginning to play against great players on the big courts. That’s been so motivational for those guys to keep going. All of a sudden, age just becomes a number.”

The Swiss star was in fine form, winning 71 per cent of his service points and converting all five of his break point chances. Victory takes Federer to a 53-11 mark at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden, where he has lifted the trophy four times, most recently in 2014 (d. Djokovic).

After being sidelined for the second half of the 2016 season, Federer made a remarkable comeback at the start of this year, beating Stan Wawrinka and Rafael Nadal in back-to-back five-set tussles to clinch his 18th Grand Slam championship at the Australian Open.

There was a surprise for Federer last week, though, in his second tour-level tournament of the year in Dubai, where he was upset by Evgeny Donskoy in the second round. The Basel native looks to bounce back this week, but finds himself in the toughest quarter of the draw, alongside Nadal and Novak Djokovic.

Federer goes on to face 24^th seed Steve Johnson, who edged Kevin Anderson 6-4, 3-6, 7-6(4) in two hours and 14 minutes. Federer leads his FedEx ATP Head2Head rivalry with Johnson 1-0, defeating the American in straight-sets last year at Wimbledon.

Two more Americans were in action on Sunday evening. #NextGenATP player Taylor Fritz recorded the biggest win of his young career as he upset sixth seed Marin Cilic 4-6, 7-5, 6-4 in two hours and 18 minutes.

Cilic led 6-4, 3-1, but Fritz fought back to level the match. The 19-year-old American could not close it out as he served for the match at 5-3 in the decider, but regrouped to break Cilic in the next game, leaving the court victorious as the crowd chanted his name.

“It was amazing,” Fritz said of his first win over a Top 10 player. “Just the whole experience with the crowd, how I came back in the match, it’s just, words can’t describe it, really.

“I thought the main thing today was how I returned serve. I thought I returned much better than normal.

“I don’t think it’s the strongest parts of my game. I thought I did a really good job of returning one of the best servers in the game throughout that match. Also, I thought I did a pretty good job of competing and kind of just sticking in the match and staying solid.”

Fritz, a native of Rancho Santa Fe, goes on to face Malek Jaziri as he bids to post his best run at an ATP World Tour Masters 1000 tournament. 

Jack Sock recovered from a second-set disaster to defeat Swiss qualifier Henri Laaksonen 6-3, 0-6, 6-4 in one hour and 40 minutes. The Nebraska native broke decisively in the ninth game of the decider as he set a third-round clash with Grigor Dimitrov.

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Kontinen/Peers Extend Masters 1000 Win Streak

Henri Kontinen and John Peers extended their dominant run in ATP World Tour Masters 1000 events, downing Fabrice Martin and Lucas Pouille 7-6(4), 6-4 at the BNP Paribas Open on Sunday. The Finnish-Aussie tandem have now won six straight matches at the Masters 1000 level, following their maiden triumph in Paris last year. 

Overall, Kontinen and Peers are an impressive 19-2 since late October, having also lifted the trophy at the ATP Finals to cap 2016 and the Australian Open to open 2017. The third seeds will face German brothers Alexander Zverev and Mischa Zverev for a spot in the quarter-finals.

Meanwhile, sixth seeds Raven Klaasen and Rajeev Ram set a meeting with Rafael Nadal and Bernard Tomic after holding off Benoit Paire and Michael Venus 6-3, 5-7, 10-5 in one hour and 17 minutes. Runners-up a year ago in Miami, Klaasen and Ram converted two of four break chances.

The third doubles match of the day ended in a brisk 58 minutes, as Lukasz Kubot and Marcelo Melo moved past Paolo Lorenzi and Albert Ramos-Vinolas 6-2, 6-1. 

In an all-Argentine clash, Juan Martin del Potro advanced to the BNP Paribas Open third round with 7-6(5), 6-3 victory over Federico Delbonis on Sunday in Indian Wells. After hitting a hot shot tweener-lob winner in the early stages, del Potro fended off set point at 30/40 in the 10th game before sealing the opener in the ensuing tie-break.

“It has been a great year for me. Last season, I played even better than what I expected with my injuries. I’m looking forward to keep going up the rankings this year, trying to get closer to the top guys,” said del Potro. “If I stay healthy and play at the same level as last year, I think I will be close to that goal.”

The Tandil native claimed the only break of the match in the fourth game of the second set to prevail in one hour and 51 minutes. The 28-year-old del Potro is playing just his third tournament of the season after taking time at the start of the year to work more on his fitness.

The 31st seed has found the Indian Wells Tennis Garden to be a happy hunting ground in recent years, reaching the final in 2013 and the semifinals in 2011 (l. to Nadal both times). Next up for del Potro will be either Novak Djokovic, whom he lost to in the Acapulco second round last week, or Kyle Edmund.