Reilly Opelka displayed unwavering mental toughness and big hitting under pressure on Saturday at the New York Open. The 21-year-old American saved six match points in the second-set tie-break to edge top seed John Isner 6-7(10), 7-6(14), 7-6(4) and reach his first ATP Tour final.

Isner and Opelka broke the ATP Tour record for combined aces in a three-set match (81), with 43 aces for Opelka and 38 for Isner. They shattered the previous record set by Nick Kyrgios and Ryan Harrison (71) this past month in Brisbane, with 44 aces for Kyrgios and 27 for Harrison.

Opelka improves his FedEx ATP Head2Head against Isner to 2-1 and has won their past two matches, including a first-round victory at this year’s Australian Open for his first Grand Slam main draw win. The pair hit a combined 87 aces in their Melbourne clash (47 for Isner, 40 for Opelka), which saw Opelka win in four tie-breaks. They have now played seven straight tie-breaks, with each man earning one service break each in those seven sets.

“Both of us were serving ridiculously well, so it was always going to come down to that,” said Isner. “Essentially, heads I win, tails I lose, and it landed on tails.”

World No. 89 Opelka will face qualifier Brayden Schnur for the title after the Canadian fought off five set points in the opening set to defeat sixth seed Sam Querrey 7-6(7), 4-6, 6-3. Schnur also saved match points this week, erasing two in his second-round victory over third seed Steve Johnson.

Neither Isner nor Opelka faced a break point in the opening set. In the tie-break, Isner made eight of nine first-serves and saved set points down 5/6 and 7/8. With Opelka serving at 8/9, Isner claimed the only mini-break of the tie-break with a strong approach to Opelka’s backhand and a solid smash to wrap up the set.

The second set also progressed to a tie-break without any break points. Opelka trailed 4/6, staving off his first match point on Isner’s serve with a cracking down-the-line backhand. The 21-year-old erased more match points with clutch hitting at 7/8, 9/10, 11/12 and 13/14. Isner saved the first four set points against him with aces, but serving at 14/15, Opelka rifled a forehand passing shot winner on the run to level the match.

Isner and Opelka earned their first break points of the match in the second and third games of the deciding set, but moved into a final-set tie-break without any breaks of serve. Isner pushed a forehand passing shot just wide at 3/4 and the slight opening was all Opelka needed. The 21-year-old closed out the contest on his first match point and pumped his fist in celebration.

Jean-Julien Rojer and Horia Tecau are back to top form at the ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament. After losing their first three matches of 2019, they reached the final in Rotterdam on Saturday by outlasting Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury 3-6, 6-2, 10-7.

Awaiting them in the championship match are Jeremy Chardy and Henri Kontinen, who also rallied from a set down to defeat fourth seeds Marcel Granollers and Nikola Mektic 6-7(3), 6-4, 10-6.

Shortly after completing their grueling singles semi-final at the Argentina Open, Diego Schwartzman and Dominic Thiem returned to Court Guillermo Vilas and recorded a 6-4, 3-6, 10-6 semi-final win over Spaniards Jaume Munar and Albert Ramos-Vinolas. They’ll play top seeds Maximo Gonzalez and Horacio Zeballos of Argentina for the title. Thiem and Schwartzman are both looking for their first ATP Tour doubles title.

At the New York Open, German pair Kevin Krawietz and Andreas Mies reached their first ATP Tour final by defeating fourth seeds Robert Lindstedt and Tim Puetz 6-2, 6-4. Next up for them is the winner of the other semi-final featuring French duo Adrian Mannarino and Hugo Nys against Santiago Gonzalez of Mexico and Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi of Pakistan.

Get the details on the biggest week of Brayden Schnur’s career as the World No. 154 in the ATP Rankings goes from qualifying alternate to his first ATP Tour final at the New York Open.

• On Sunday, Brayden Schnur defeated 17-year-old Long Island native Cannon Kingsley in the opening round of qualifying.

• On Monday, he reached a career-high No. 154 in the ATP Rankings and beat Alexei Popyrin to qualify.

• On Tuesday, he earned the first ATP Tour win of his career over countryman and Columbia University sophomore Jack Mingjie Lin.

• On Wednesday, he rallied from 5-2 down in the third set and saved two match points to beat No. 3 seed Steve Johnson.

• On Thursday, he went to sleep at 3:30 am after his win over Johnson finished Wednesday at 11:37 pm.

• On Friday, he hit 24 aces and held in all 18 of his service games to defeat Paolo Lorenzi 6-7(7) 7-6(5) 7-5.

• On Saturday, he saved five set points in the first set of 7-6(7) 4-6 6-3 victory over No. 6 seed Sam Querrey.

• In Sunday’s final, he bids to become the second player in as many weeks to earn his first win and title at the same event (Juan Ignacio Londero at Cordoba).

• In Monday’s ATP Rankings, he will break into the Top 100 if he wins the title.

– Research from Joshua Rey

Brayden Schnur’s best week ever got even better on Saturday at the New York Open. Having never won an ATP Tour main draw match before this week, the Canadian qualifier saved five set points in the opening set against sixth seed Sam Querrey and reached the final with a 7-6(7), 4-6, 6-3 victory over the American.

Schnur, the final alternate into the qualifying draw, saved two match points in his second-round win over third seed Steve Johnson and won the longest match of the tournament in his quarter-final against Paolo Lorenzi (2 hr, 39 min). Currently at a career-high No. 154 in the ATP Rankings, he’ll crack the Top 100 on Monday if he takes the title.

The Canadian erased four set points on his serve at 4-5 in the first set and another at 5-6. Schnur couldn’t convert on set point opportunities in the tie-break at 6/5 and 7/6, but a pair of forehand errors from Querrey at 7/7 gave him the early advantage.

The qualifier had a break point opportunity to lead 4-0 in the second set, but the occasion appeared to overwhelm him and his shots began landing shorter. Querrey took advantage to level the match, but Schnur regrouped with an early break to lead 2-0 in the deciding set. The slight advantage was all he needed. Schnur converted on his first match point with a strong serve and closed the contest after one hour and 54 minutes.

Schnur will take on the winner of the all-American clash between top seed John Isner and Reilly Opelka. He has not faced either player before.

More than 20 months after reaching his 28th tour-level final at Roland Garros in 2017, Stan Wawrinka defeated Kei Nishikori 6-2, 4-6, 6-4 at the ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament to move into his 29th championship match on Saturday.

The 33-year-old, who required two left knee surgeries in August 2017, landed 35 winners, including eight aces, to triumph after two hours and 13 minutes. Wawrinka will be aiming to capture his second title in Rotterdam after beating Milos Raonic and Tomas Berdych in back-to-back matches to lift the trophy in 2015.

The three-time Grand Slam champion will meet Gael Monfils in Sunday’s final. Wawrinka leads Monfils 3-2 in their FedEx ATP Head2Head series, but the pair have met just once in the past eight years, at 2017 Roland Garros, with the Swiss triumphing in straight sets.  

Wawrinka raced into a 2-0 lead at the Ahoy Rotterdam, claiming the opening break of the match with a crafty short return and a well-struck forehand passing shot down the line. The Swiss soon doubled his advantage, dominating rallies with his forehand before moving up the court to rush his opponent into errors. Despite surrendering one break of serve, Wawrinka broke for a third time with his ninth winner, an angled crosscourt backhand, to take the opening set after 37 minutes.

Nishikori responded emphatically in the second set, moving into a 4-0 lead of his own after finding success attacking Wawrinka’s backhand in crucial moments. Wawrinka held firm, recovering one of the two breaks after finding further success bringing Nishikori to the net off his return. But the Japanese No. 1 soon levelled the match, holding serve to love at 5-4 with a driven cross-court backhand winner.

In a tense third set, both men held serve with relative ease until Nishikori served to stay in the match at 4-5. After ripping a forehand winner to complete an impressive service hold in the previous game, Wawrinka continued to dictate points with his forehand. From 30/30, the Swiss fired his 34th and 35th winners, both on his forehand side, to book his place in the championship match.

Nishikori was bidding to reach his second ATP Tour final of the season, following his title run at the Brisbane International (d. Medvedev) last month. The Japanese No. 1 overcame Medvedev in three sets to snap a nine-match losing streak in tour-level championship matches.

Did You Know?
This was only the third tour-level semi-final Wawrinka has contested since reaching the 2017 Roland Garros final (l. to Nadal). The Swiss reached two semi-finals in 2018, falling to Mirza Basic in Sofia and Martin Klizan in St. Petersburg.

Seven days after falling to Daniil Medvedev in the Sofia Open semi-finals, Gael Monfils defeated the Russian 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 to advance to his second ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament final on Saturday.

The 2016 runner-up (l. to Klizan) fired 29 winners to record his 15th win in 22 matches at the opening ATP 500 event of the season after two hours and eight minutes. Monfils improves to 8-2 this season and will be aiming to capture his first ATP Tour trophy since lifting the Qatar ExxonMobil Open title (d. Rublev) in January 2018.

Monfils will meet top seed Kei Nishikori or Stan Wawrinka for the title on Sunday. The 32-year-old trails Nishikori 1-4 in their FedEx ATP Head2Head series and has triumphed in two of five FedEx ATP Head2Head meetings against Wawrinka.

In a series of marathon rallies, Medvedev and Monfils opened the court and mixed the pace well to entertain the crowd in the opening stages. At 2-2, Medvedev capitalised on back-to-back errors from Monfils to claim the first break and, despite surrendering his advantage, the Russian clinched the first set with back-to-back games from 4-4. With comfort on his backhand side, Medvedev proved the more consistent player in extended rallies to extract crucial errors from his opponent.

Monfils began to increase his aggression in the second set, hitting through his forehand and moving up the court to gain a 2-0 lead. The Frenchman may have gifted Medvedev a route back into the set with consecutive double faults at 3-1 (30/30), but Monfils hit through the court on his backhand to regain his break advantage and soon levelled the match with a powerful serve out wide.

After trading breaks early in the deciding set, Monfils earned two break points at 4-4 with an imaginative drop shot, before clinching the break with an aggressive approach to Medvedev’s forehand. Once again, Monfils moved to the net to earn two match points and then booked his place in the final after dragging Medvedev off the court with an angled backhand approach.

Medvedev was bidding to reach his seventh ATP Tour final (4-2) after lifting his fourth tour-level trophy at the Sofia Open last week (d. Fucsovics). The 23-year-old Russian leads the ATP Tour with 14 tour-level victories (14-3) this season.

Did You Know?
Monfils ended a streak of 15 consecutive sets won by Medvedev to take the match to a deciding set. The last man to win a set against Medvedev prior to Monfils was Robin Haase, who led the Russian by a set in the Sofia Open Round of 16 last week.

Dominic Thiem was made to work by Pablo Cuevas of Uruguay on Friday at the Argentina Open, but remained unbeaten (11-0) in Buenos Aires after a hard-fought 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 win to reach the semi-finals.

He’ll play fourth seed Diego Schwartzman, who reached his first Buenos Aires semi-final with a 6-1, 7-5 victory over Albert Ramos-Vinolas of Spain. The Argentine hasn’t lost a set against Ramos-Vinolas in their three FedEx ATP Head2Head meetings. Although he trails Thiem 1-3 in their FedEx ATP Head2Head, Schwartzman won their most recent clash at the 2018 Rogers Cup.

Thiem struggled to find his footing early against Cuevas, who is in fine form after reaching his first semi-final of 2019 last week in Cordoba (l. to Pella). But after dropping the opener, Thiem raised his level and raced to a 3-0 advantage in the second set. The top seed was broken as he attempted to serve out the second set at 5-3, but regrouped with powerful baseline hitting and immediately broke Cuevas in the next game to level the match.

The third set started identically to the second, with Thiem earning an early break of serve with a gorgeous backhand return winner and sprinting to a 3-0 lead. The early momentum was all the Austrian needed and he eventually closed out the match after one hour and 49 minutes. The 25-year-old Austrian improved his FedEx ATP Head2Head record against Cuevas to 3-2. 

Guido Pella delighted the home crowd by erasing four match points to defeat Jaume Munar of Spain 6-7(3), 7-6(9), 6-1. Munar was unable to convert on two match points on his serve at 5-4 in the second set and two more in the tie-break at 6/5 and 8/7. Pella made good on his third set point at 10/9 with a crafty angled forehand and then raced through the remainder of the contest.

The Argentine is playing some of the best tennis of his career, having recorded a runner-up finish last week in Cordoba (l. Londero). He has also pushed himself back into the Top 50 of the ATP Rankings.

Pella will next take on third seed Marco Cecchinato, who prevailed in a grueling baseline battle against Spaniard Roberto Carballes Baena 7-6(3), 6-4. Cecchinato won his only previous FedEx ATP Head2Head meeting against Pella this past July in the Umag final.