American Reilly Opelka keeps checking off the milestones to start 2019. Last month, he earned his first Grand Slam win, upsetting No. 10 John Isner in four sets at the Australian Open. On Thursday, Opelka advanced to his third ATP Tour quarter-final at the New York Open.

The 6’11” Opelka was leading Uzbekistan’s Denis Istomin 6-7(8), 7-6(6), 1-0 when the 32-year-old retired (leg). Opelka hit 32 aces and won 95 per cent of his first-serve points (56/59) in the abbreviated match.

The 21-year-old will try to reach his second tour-level semi-final (Atlanta 2016) when he faces Spain’s Guillermo Garcia-Lopez, who beat Aussie John Millman 7-6(4), 1-6, 6-4 to reach his first ATP Tour quarter-final of the year.

The two other Americans in singles action had a mixed day at the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum on Long Island. Sixth seed Sam Querrey had no trouble with Moldova’s Radu Albot, winning 6-3, 6-4. The 2018 finalist landed almost 75 per cent of his first serves and never faced a break point.

Querrey will face Jason Jung of Chinese Taipei. The 29-year-old upset second seed Frances Tiafoe of the U.S. 6-3, 7-5. Jung, No. 143 in the ATP Rankings, rode an early break to a one-set lead. He stumbled while serving for the match at 5-4 in the second, but he broke back immediately.

“It’s been a long time coming. I’ve worked hard for a lot of years. It hasn’t been easy. I’m just so happy for this moment and have to try to enjoy this for a couple hours and then prepare for tomorrow,” Jung said.

Tiafoe, who received a late wild card, was fresh off his first Grand Slam quarter-final at the Australian Open (l. to Nadal). “I thought he played great tonight. He came after me, and I just didn’t have answers for him,” Tiafoe said.

In doubles, Americans Tennys Sandgren/Jackson Withrow upset Bob Bryan/Mike Bryan, the top seeds, 7-6(9), 6-4. The Bryans were playing in their second event of the year after making the quarter-finals in Melbourne.

Did You Know?
In the semi-finals of the Boys’ 16s singles championships at the 2004 Easter Bowl, Querrey defeated Jung 6-1, 4-6, 6-4. “I remember it was three sets, and I had a really bad back. I guess I wasn’t doing my core exercises when I was 15, but it’ll be exciting tomorrow,” Jung said.

This time last year, Sam Querrey was playing arguably the best tennis of his career. In the New York Open final, the American had a chance to not just lift his 11th ATP Tour title, but crack the Top 10 of the ATP Rankings for the first time. But Querrey lost to eventual Nitto ATP Finals qualifier Kevin Anderson in a final-set tie-break.

It was part of a theme for Querrey in 2018. The 6’6” right-hander lost 22 matches last season, and eight of them came in final-set tie-breaks. Seven of those eight defeats came in the Round of 16 or earlier in a tournament, meaning that he lost out on several opportunities for big runs.

“It makes a huge difference. Not that you’re going to win every one of those, but if all of a sudden I go 50-50 on those, that’s four more matches won, that’s 100-something more ATP Ranking points and you never know what’s on the other side of those,” Querrey said. “You can continue on with more wins, so it’s tough to swallow those. I think I was pretty passive in a lot of those matches, and that’s something that I really want to focus on in those matches this year if I get to those positions again.”

Querrey owns 20 victories against Top 10 opponents, so he has proven his ability to perform under pressure. But those triumphs have come when he has swung freely and let go of any apprehension in his game, competing ‘light’. That’s something he is trying to improve in 2019.

“Sometimes it’s easier said than done. But that’s definitely going to be my theme this year, and I’m not just doing it in those pressure situations late in a match,” Querrey said. “I’m trying to do it from point one, that way, when those situations come, it’s not like, ‘Oh, now all of a sudden I’m going to try to hit the ball big.’ If you start from the first point and do those things it won’t be awkward or jarring later in a match.”

Craig Boynton, Querrey’s coach, said: “In a nutshell, it’s commitment without hesitation and letting whatever happens, let it be. Let it be. If you hit a winner, if you miss by a little, if you miss by a lot, understand the situation. Understand what you’re trying to ultimately accomplish, commit, and move onto the next.

“For Sam that is the recipe for being light and creating momentum.”

Querrey fell to No. 57 last October, eight months on from being on the doorstep of the Top 10. It’s not the first time the 31-year-old has faced adversity. A moment that sticks out came in 2009, when Querrey fell through a glass coffee table in a freak accident and missed three months after undergoing emergency surgery in Bangkok to control bleeding in his arm. In a way, overcoming that was easier for Querrey than his winless streak in deciding-set tie-breaks last season, and less frustrating.

But, just as he put that accident behind him, he’s ready to do the same to his passive attitude in 2018.

“I feel like if I would have played more aggressively or whatever I would’ve done to win those matches, it could have changed my year a little bit ,” Querrey said. “Losing 7-6 in the third, I feel like you can tweak a couple things and really change the tide.”

Querrey, now No. 49, feels that he is far away from his best tennis. On Thursday at the New York Open, he comprehensively defeated a tough Radu Albot in 70 minutes to reach the quarter-finals.

“I know what I’m capable of because I’ve done these things before, I’ve beaten those top players. It is frustrating at times when my [ATP] Ranking dips or when I lose to people. You’re going to take bad losses every now and then, but it happens probably a little too much for me,” Querrey said. “But at the same time, at any given point I feel like I can run through a tournament, play well and have those big runs, so I try to look at it that way more than the other way.”

Querrey is yet to play a final-set tie-break this season, and he is 2-2 in tie-breaks overall. But he’s not worrying about what happened in 2018.

“I’m going to try to not forget about last year, but learn from it,” Querrey said. “If I do lose those matches, I want to lose them more on my terms and I think if I do that, it’ll be a little bit easier to swallow and I’ll be able to move forward in an easier way.”

That losing feeling at the Argentina Open? Dominic Thiem still doesn’t know it.

The top seed stayed perfect in Buenos Aires on Thursday, winning his 10^th consecutive match at the Argentina Open 6-4, 6-4 against Germany’s Maximilian Marterer. Thiem has won two titles in the Argentine capital and will face six-time ATP Tour clay-court titlist Pablo Cuevas for a place in the semi-finals.

The Uruguayan executed some perfection as well, winning all four break points against fifth seed Joao Sousa of Portugal to advance 6-4, 7-5. Thiem and Cuevas have faced off four times, including three on clay. Thiem won two of their three clay-court FedEx ATP Head2Head matchups.

On Thursday, the Austrian was playing his first match in nearly a month, since 17 January, when he retired against #NextGenATP Aussie Alexei Popyrin in the second round of the Australian Open. But the 25-year-old showed few signs of rust on the South American clay.

Thiem broke in the ninth game of the opener, and, although he stumbled in the second, losing his serve twice, he recovered in time to break again in the ninth game for the straight-sets win. Thiem improved to 2-0 against Marterer in their FedEx ATP Head2Head series. It’s only his second win of the young 2019 season.

This year will be the last time to see David Ferrer playing on the ATP Tour, and his time in Buenos Aires arrived at its end against countryman Albert Ramos-Vinolas, who saved two match points and advanced 3-6, 7-6(9), 6-3.

Watch Hot Shot: Ferrer Rips Return Winner

Ferrer had match points at 6/7 and 8/9 in the second-set tie-break, but both were Ramos-Vinolas’ racquet, and he eventually escaped the 20-point tie-break. The 36-year-old Ferrer plans to retire at the Mutua Madrid Open in May.

Ramos-Vinolas will face home favourite Diego Schwartzman, who fought past Slovenia’s Aljaz Bedene 6-4, 2-6, 6-2 to book a quarter-final spot. Bedene saved all four break points in the second set, but Schwartzman found ways to break through in the decider, converting three of his four chances.

Reilly Opelka, at 6’11”, is the tallest player on the ATP Tour alongside Ivo Karlovic. But the American still has plenty of room to grow, and that’s a good thing for the 21-year-old.

Take his second-round match at the New York Open against Denis Istomin as an example. Opelka struck 32 aces through two sets and one service game in the third set before the Ukrainian retired due to a leg strain. If he kept that pace up, he would have matched Karlovic’s record for most aces in a best-of-three set match with 45. But Opelka wasn’t thrilled with his performance, despite advancing to his third ATP Tour quarter-final.

“I was pretty disappointed with how I played from the baseline today,” Opelka said.

In the first set against Istomin, Opelka won just two of 34 return points. The American said he was cutting short his forehand follow-through and was unable to stay in rallies because of it. That may not seem optimal. But nevertheless, Opelka used his strong serving to hang around, force a decider and advance.

“It’s a good feeling. It’s part of my game. I mean, part of [being] anyone that relies so much on their serve, you can kind of get away with that. Obviously I don’t want to. It’s just not as fun,” Opelka said. “I didn’t even have a sniff on his serve until late in the second set. So from my standpoint, it’s just like I’m just focusing on my serve and I’m going out there and not making a return, not putting any pressure on him. It’s kind of disappointing and it takes some of the excitement out. But at the same time, there’s a positive to it.”

If nothing else, that shows there is room to improve. The 2016 Atlanta semi-finalist says for the past couple of years he has been working especially hard on his forehand and his service return. And while he isn’t completely satisfied with his progress, Opelka cracked the Top 100 of the ATP Rankings for the first time on 19 November 2018 and is currently at a career-high of World No. 89.

“Reilly could be a little negative at times with some of the things he says, but he’s a dangerous guy to play. Nobody likes to play Reilly or John [Isner] or Kevin [Anderson] and these guys who serve like that,” said 10-time ATP Tour titlist Sam Querrey, who is also into the New York quarter-finals. “Reilly kind of goes for broke sometimes and is a scary and dangerous guy to play.

“He seems to be getting into a little bit of a rhythm now with his third quarter-final and the more he keeps winning these matches and putting himself in these situations, his [ATP] Ranking is just going to climb higher and higher and he’s going to be in more main draws of these tournaments. His ceiling’s high. When you serve like that and you’re aggressive as he is, he can beat anyone. Novak doesn’t want to play him right now.”

But for the moment, Opelka is taking it one step at a time. The Florida resident has only played 29 tour-level matches, and he is trying to gain more experience on the ATP Tour. He has won four ATP Challenger Tour titles.

“I want to stay in the Top 100, I want to focus on staying here and having more opportunities at this level because even around 100, you still have to play a good amount on the [ATP Challenger] Tour,” Opelka said. “If I could stay more and have more opportunities on the tour-level, that’s kind of where I want to go.”

While Opelka has time to continue honing his strokes, and he knows that is important, that is not what he believes is the key to spending more time at tour-level.

“I think it’s just being consistent: consistently healthy, consistent emotionally every single week,” Opelka said. “Having a good mindset and being physically able to play and compete is the biggest part.“

If anyone knows what Opelka is going through right now, it’s Isner. While Isner competed at the University of Georgia and Opelka opted to turn professional rather than go to college, the reigning Miami winner and 2018 Nitto ATP Finals qualifier has been in his younger compatriot’s shoes. And as 33-year-old Isner proved last season, there is always time to grow.

“I just think he’s definitely maturing. I think that’s the most important thing. We obviously know what he brings to the table… for a big guy he moves well. Of course he serves extremely well on top of that,” Isner said. “Just like me, he’s a guy that’s going to be in a lot of matches even if he’s really not playing so great, because of his serve. He’s very young… He’s got a lot more years to develop down the road. He’s going to be a force, in my opinion, going forward for a pretty long time.”

Kei Nishikori stretched the best start of his career on Thursday, beating Latvian Ernests Gulbis 6-1, 6-4 to reach the ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament quarter-finals in Rotterdam.

The top-seeded Japanese improved to 10-1 on the season, with his only loss coming in the Australian Open quarter-finals against eventual champion Novak Djokovic. Nishikori will next face Hungarian Marton Fucsovics, who beat Nikoloz Basilashvili of Georgia 7-6(1), 6-1. 

“Today was pretty good… so much better than the first match, for sure,” Nishikori said. “It wasn’t easy… but I think I did really well.”

Gulbis reached the Rotterdam semi-finals in 2014 (l. to Del Potro), but the Latvian was smothered by Nishikori’s aggressive play. Nishikori won the first 12 points of the match and later led 5-0, behind two breaks of serve.

Gulbis slightly recovered in the second, earning a break in the sixth game. But Nishikori broke for the fourth and final time in the ninth game.

Basilashvili, who relies on ruthless hitting, had an off day against Fucsovics, hitting 40 unforced errors, including 23 from his forehand. Fucsovics, meanwhile, was steady, especially in the second set, when he lost only one point behind his first serve (9/10).

It was 16 April, 2018. A blanket of humidity descended on the west coast of Florida, as players and fans scrambled to brave the scorching spring conditions on Day 1 of the Sarasota Open. In other words, it was just your typical afternoon at the ATP Challenger Tour event, with competitors battling to adapt and survive on the green clay. 

But as his Challenger colleagues kicked off the tournament, Juan Ignacio Londero was enjoying a well-deserved day of rest. A large pine tree towered overhead, as he nestled against its trunk, gazing across the courts of the Laurel Oak Country Club. The chaos of opening day echoed throughout the grounds, but a pensive Londero was undeterred, reflecting on the moment that had just changed his career.

“I’ve been trying so hard to earn a title for a long time. This is amazing. It’s been a long process and a difficult one at that.”

At the age of 24, Londero was coming off his first ATP Challenger Tour triumph. A day earlier, he was standing on Centre Court at the CDMX Open in Mexico City, celebrating his biggest victory in front of a sold-out crowd. Not only was he appearing in the first final of his eight-year career, but he had stormed through qualifying to get there, eventually claiming the title with the loss of just one set.

Following his victory in the Mexican capital, Londero was speechless, unable to describe his emotions from the previous week. Ten months later and the Argentine is at a loss for words once again. Another career-altering moment has arrived, but this time on the ATP Tour. 

On Sunday, Londero captured his maiden tour-level crown at his hometown Cordoba Open. In front of friends and family, he would make a splash in his return to the ATP Tour, six years removed from his debut on the circuit. 

“I arrived at the tournament knowing that I was playing well,” Londero said. “I arrived in Cordoba knowing that I could win a few rounds, but I never saw myself in the final or winning the title.”

He was an unseeded wild card who had never won a tour-level match entering the week, so how did Londero suddenly put it all together for such a dream run? Where did he develop his game for his big breakthrough? Look no further than his 2018 campaign on the ATP Challenger Tour. After many years struggling with injuries off the court and consistency between the lines, it finally all came together. Not all paths to stardom are a straight line and Londero is showing his own formula to the top.

Shortest Gap Between First Challenger & ATP Tour Titles (Since 2009)

The Argentine endured a long journey as he fought through years of injury and illness. In 2015, he battled an ailment similar to the mumps, which drained his energy and left him bed-ridden for more than a month and unable to compete for even longer. And when a herniated disc forced him to the sidelines once again, Londero admits that it was one of his lowest moments.

“Before Mexico City, I did not know what the winning form felt like. It was a dozen things that just kept happening to me and I got stuck.”

But something clicked for Londero as he competed on the ATP Challenger Tour in 2018. Mexico City would prove to be the turning point as he battled to a 40-win season, later adding a second crown on the clay of Marburg, Germany, in July. Few players tasted victory as often as Londero, who was one of just three members of the 40-win club, along with Jordan Thompson and Christian Garin. In total, he amassed a 40-17 record, fast becoming one of the more feared competitors on the tour. His 2018 campaign proved to be the springboard to his ATP Tour breakthrough.

“I always knew that I could play at this level,” Londero said after his victory in Cordoba. “I did not see myself as being very far. Last year, I won two Challenger titles, reached another final, and I was trying to make the jump to the ATP Tour. But I never imagined this. It’s incredible to go from playing Challengers to get to this moment.

“Last year, I found my identity on the court and worked hard to find my game. I know how I have to play. Learning that was so important for my career. I was concentrating only on what was going on in the moment and on the court – not on who was winning, what I was doing right or wrong – but focusing on the moment.”

This level of discipline was instilled in Londero by his new coach Andres Schneiter. One of the top coaches on the ATP Challenger Tour in 2018, Schneiter also guided Christian Garin to a 46-15 mark, three titles and a Top 100 debut. Both pupils credit him with changing their mentality on and off the court. That is, channeling their doubts and internal dialogues in a productive manner.

“I have a way of working with my players, where I work to build the mental part first,” said Schneiter. “So that the player is focused and composed on the court and when they are away from it as well.”

Not only did Londero lift his first ATP Tour trophy on Sunday, but he celebrated his Top 100 debut in the process, soaring 43 spots to a career-high No. 69 in the ATP Rankings. Considering he was outside the Top 350 a year ago, it is a staggering achievement. With the opportunity to compete for even bigger prizes in 2019, Londero has his sights set on the Top 50 and beyond.