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Thursday, June 1, 2023

RG.5- Kayla Seizes the Day

Earth completes one rotation on its axis in the span of a single day. Kayla Day's journey just took a little bit longer.



We hear it all the time. Junior success does not necessarily mean a great pro career. For every Martina Hingis who dominates at both stages, there are far more top girls' players who slowly fade away, battle injuries and often never pan out and become the player they'd expected (or hoped) they would be.

What to make of Miss Day? She's existed somewhere in the middle. So far. But things are looking up after more than half a decade of struggling to find her way as a pro.

Now 23, Day was the 2016 U.S. Open girls' champ. That same slam, Day (as a WC) had made her major MD debut at Flushing Meadows, posting a 1st Round win before falling in her next match to Madison Keys. She'd hit the ground running in her pro career. In 2017, at age 17, she reached the 3rd Round in Indian Wells in her tournament debut, upsetting recent slam semifinalist ('17 AO) Mirjana Lucic-Baroni before pushing Garbine Muguruza, who'd reach #1 six months later, to three sets. By then, Day had already reached three ITF level singles finals, winning a $50K title not long after her junior win in New York.

But injuries slowed her down. Elbow, hip, foot. The injuries begat losing, which begat psychological setbacks and a resulting loss of confidence. After having threatend to reach the Top 100 (getting as high as #122 in '17), Day's ranking fell into the #400s.

By 2018, the movie "Eighth Grade" featured a lead character named "Kayla Day." But the plot didn't include anything about the life story of a tennis pro. No one was worried there might be confusion, because Day's name had already slipped out of the immediate tennis conversation.

But the *real* Kayla Day stuck to it.

Feeling homesick after her move to Florida for training purposes, the Santa Barbara native returned to California three years ago and reunited with coach Larry Mousouris, who'd been teaching her since she was a kid. Feeling good, and finally healthy, the success slowly stared to return.

From local Santa Barbara TV in 2020:



By 2021, Day was back playing in her first ITF finals in four years. Last season, she added Cecil Mamiit as a coach (while still seeking advice from Mousouris) and truly began to grow into her tennis career as she traveled for tournaments and climbed the ladder all over again. She qualified for her first tour-level events since 2018 in San Jose and at the Guadalajara 1000 event, the biggest she'd appeared in in ages. Day received a wild card into U.S. Open qualifying and won a match over a Q-seed (Irina Bara) in her first match of any kind in a major in four years.

The re-rise has continued in 2023. Day qualified for Charleston, then a month later won her biggest career title at a $100K challenger and followed that up with a $60K semifinal. She nearly claimed the USTA's reciprocal wild card berth for Roland Garros, finishing second behind Emma Navarro, but made her way through qualifying, defeating Elina Avanesyan in the final round (the Hordette had served at 5-3 in the 3rd and led 4-1 in the MTB... and currently remains alive in the RG 3rd Rd. as a LL after a 1st Rd. upset of #12 Belinda Bencic). Ranked #138, it assured Day of her first spot in a slam MD since the 2017 U.S. Open.

After opening with a win over Kristina Mladenovic, Day arrived at Court Simonne-Mathieu on Thursday with a familiar foe waiting for her: Keys.

While #20-seeded Keys is well known to be a dangerous opponent, she's also often one of the "sloppiest." No very good player this side of Alona Ostapenko (who knows *nothing* else but going for every shot, so the UE's just "land differently") commits more head-slapping unforced errors than Keys does at times, often with several coming in long strings of points. Again today, the former U.S. Open finalist had a hard time getting out of her own way, and Day seized the rather significant opportunity such a reality presented.

In the nearly two and a half hour, three-set match, Keys fired 40 winners (vs. 10 for Day), but had 74 (!) unforced errors (vs. 23). As Tennis Channel's Caroline Wozniacki noted, a player can claim an entire straight sets match by winning 48 points, so Keys essentially "gave away a match and a half."

Keys broke Day's serve seven times, but Day broke Keys *nine* times. It all led to a 6-2/4-6/6-4 win by Day, the first of her career over a Top 20 player.



So, seven years after having lost to her in New York in her last appearance in a slam 2nd Round, Day finally clips Keys in Paris. Unless this match had been played once more in Queens, you can't come much more "full circle" than that.

With a new day finally dawning for Kayla, she's sporting a "live" ranking of #111. Here comes the sun.

And she's still making new back home in Santa Barbara, too. From today...






=DAY 5 NOTES=
...Day's next opponent will be... Schmiedy! One will reach the second week of a major for the first time.

Anna Karolina Schmiedlova defeated lucky loser Aliona Bolsova on Thursday, advancing to her third career slam 3rd Round and just her second since 2015 (w/ RG '20). After jumping out to a 4-0 1st set lead vs. the Spaniard, it was suddenly 4-3 and an "Oh, Schmiedly!" moment seemed to loom. But the Slovak put that thought to rest, winning 6-3/6-4.

Bolsova's loss (along with that of Camila Osorio) leaves Elina Avanesyan as the last remaining of the half dozen LL's who were placed in the MD. She's the first to go so far in Paris since Ons Jabeur did it in 2017, but *she* had been the first to advance to the 3rd Round since Italy's Gloria Pizzichini in 1996.

...meanwhile, the kid is still rolling.



Hordettes had already been pretty hard on the Pastries at this Roland Garros. Yesterday, Anna Blinkova took down Caroline Garcia, while Avanesyan put out Leolia Jeanjean. So, really, what chance did Diane Parry have against 16-year old Mirra Andreeva on Day 5? Not much of one, it turned out.

The qualifier won 6-1/6-2, facing just one BP in the match while carving out 14 of her own (converting on five), as Andreeva continues to take names and dispense justice like some children's book combination of hall monitor and overzealous principal (while smiling like a girl who rescues moths from bird baths).



The teenager is now 22-2 in pro events this season, with *all* of those matches coming on red clay. Over the last *two* years on the surface in challenger/WTA events, she's a combined 40-6.

With her straight sets win today, through qualifying and the first two slam MD matches of her career, Andreeva has reeled off 10 straight sets. Of course, that doesn't really anything. I mean, it's not like in a million years a teenage qualifier is going to run through *ten* matches at a major without dropping a set and end up being the last person standing at the finish of the tournament or anything, right?

Oh, wait.



Parry's loss left Oceane Dodin as the last French hope to reach the 3rd Round. The hope didn't last long, as she fell in straights to #7 Ons Jabeur, creating a four-way tie for "Last Pastry Standing."

Andreeva's next opponent will be a '22 finalist, #6 Coco Gauff, who recorded her first back-to-back wins since Indian Wells with a victory over Julia Grabher today, 6-2/6-3.

With Gauff being 19 years old, a prize goes to the first person who says that in the next round Coco is going to feel ol-... oh, too late. Nevermind.

...meanwhile, after two-thirds of the South American contingent (Osorio and Nadia Podoroska) in the 2nd Round were ousted yesterday, #14-seeded Brazilian Beatriz Haddad Maia was still around to pick up the pieces on Day 5.

Facing off with Diana Shnaider, the current college player (N.C. State) looking to join former NCAA champ Peyton Stearns in the 3rd Round, Haddad Maia looked well on her way in the match, leading 6-2/2-0 before the Hordette turned things around. After failing to convert a SP at 5-4, the bandanna-clad one soon after took an MTO (hmmm...), then returned to break Haddad and claim the 2nd at 7-5.

The Brazilian led 4-2 in the 3rd, only to see Shnaider again erase that lead and knot the score at 4-all. But it was Haddad Maia who surged back last, breaking the Russian and then serving out a 6-2/5-7/6-4 win that (still a little shockingly) puts her into her first career slam 3rd Round.



Haddad Maia is the first Brazilian woman to reach a slam 3rd Round in 34 years, when *two* (Andrea Vieira and Niege Dias) reached that stage in Paris in 1989. Bia had been 0-7 in 2nd Rounds in her slam career, losing 14 of 15 sets.

...Elena Rybakina is so mean.

And, no, that's not a parroting of the opinion of Alona Ostapenko, who called her a name after losing to the Kazakh in Rome after the Latvian had seen her 2nd set lead slip away during a long rain delay following Rybakina's refusal to play and risk injury in bad conditions (of course, Alona hadn't wanted to play in the rain earlier, either, but she'd been *losing* then... so it was *different*, but also quintessentially Alona, am I right?).

No, I'm talking about the Wimbledon champ's obvious disdain for Czechs. I mean, how else can you explain Rybakina systematically dispatching *two* Czech teen Crushers in a matter of days in Paris without dropping a set or barely letting them think they had a chance? Oh, yeah... I guess maybe after winning Rome she also just realizes that there's no need to stop there.

After rocking 17-year old Brenda Fruhvirtova 6-4/6-2 in the 1st Round, today Rybakina sent 18-year old Linda Noskova out 6-3/6-3, leaving Karolina Muchova as the only Czech in the Final 32 (after five had been there in '22). Rybakina's 8th straight win (two more than Elina Svitolina, who I said had seven in a row yesterday after naively expecting that one of the Tennis Channel commentators surely wouldn't be counting a Strasbourg walkover as an actual "win") gives her 30 on the season, just one fewer than tour leader Aryna Sabalenka.



And I guess, because she's actually so nice...(sigh)... Elena is forgiven for taking part in the Backspin cardinal sin of having both opponents in a match wear the exact same outfits.

Rybakina would have to reach the semifinals to have another shot at the world #1, against whom she staged a 2nd set comeback in the Rome semis, leading to an injury that forced Iga Swiatek to retire early in the 3rd.

But the path to that potential match-up remains true, as Swiatek resumed her frontrunner role today vs. Claire Liu, dropping her second bagel of this RG (and 12th of '23, along w/ 13 "breadsticks") on the Bannerette in a 6-4/6-0 win.

Again, though, Swiatek had a bit of a choppy start. She led 3-0 in the 1st, but soon saw Liu close to 4-3. Swiatek was broken in two of her first three service games. She closed out the 1st, then took another 3-0 lead in the 2nd. This time there was no closure. Well, except for the Pole picking up her 30th match win of the season, and improving to 14-2 on clay.










...HAPPY BIRTHDAY, LA PETIT TAUREAU... ON DAY 5:




...LPT 2003 SF vs. SERENA... ON DAY 5:



If you want to incense a Serena fan, tell them that "The Wave" is at 13:20. A few days later, they'll finally run out of breath and you'll be able to tell that 23 majors is still *pretty good.*



...IT'S BEEN 20 YEARS... ON DAY 5:




...YEP... ON DAY 5:


via GIPHY




...HAPPY LPT DAY... ON DAY 5:















What it'll look like at Lenglen when the roof is closed in 2024...




1989 Roland Garros: Arantxa Sanchez and Michael Chang. Now that was a moment.








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*2023 RG FINAL 32 BY NATION*
8 - RUS
...Alexandrova, Avanesyan, Blinkova, Kasatkina, M.Andreeva, Pavlyuchenkova, Potapova, Rakhimova
6 - USA (Day, Gauff, Pegula, Pera, Stearns, Stephens)
2 - KAZ (Putintseva, Rybakina)
2 - UKR (Svitoina, Tsurenko)
1 - BEL (Mertens)
1 - BLR (Sabalenka)
1 - BRA (Haddad Maia)
1 - CAN (Andreescu)
1 - CHN (Wang Xinyu)
1 - CZE (Muchova)
1 - DEN (Tauson)
1 - ESP (Sorribes Tormo)
1 - ITA (Cocciaretto)
1 - POL (Swiatek)
1 - ROU (Begu)
1 - SRB (Danilovic)
1 - SVK (Schmiedlova)
1 - TUN (Jabeur)

*Coupe LA PETIT TAUREAU WINNERS*
2016 Yulia Putintseva, KAZ
2017 Elina Svitolina, UKR
2018 Mihaela Buzarnescu, ROU
2019 Simona Halep, ROU
2020 Simona Halep, ROU
2021 Carla Suarez Navarro, ESP
2022 Diane Parry, FRA and Iga Swiatek, POL
2023 Justine Henin - 20th Anniversary of first RG title

*RECENT RG "LAST WILD CARD STANDING"*
2017 Chloe Paquet/FRA (2nd Rd.)
2018 Pauline Parmentier/FRA (3rd Rd.)
2019 Lauren Davis/USA, Priscilla Hon/AUS & Diane Parry/FRA (2nd)
2020 G.Bouchard/CAN, C.Burel/FRA & T.Pironkova/BUL (3rd)
2021 Astra Sharma/AUS & Harmony Tan/FRA (2nd)
2022 Leolita Jeanjean/FRA & Dasha Saville/AUS (3rd)
2023 L.Jeanjean/FRA, E.Navarro/USA & D.Parry/FRA (2nd)

*RECENT RG "LAST PASTRY STANDING"*
2015 Alize Cornet (4th)
2016 A.Cornet, K.Mladenovic & P.Parmentier (3rd)
2017 Caroline Garcia & Kristina Mladenovic (QF)
2018 Caroline Garcia (4th)
2019 C.Garcia, K.Mladenovic & D.Parry (2nd)
2020 Fiona Ferro & Caroline Garcia (4th)
2021 F.Ferro, C.Garcia, K.Mladenovic, H.Tan (2nd)
2022 A.Cornet, L.Jeanjean & D.Parry (3rd)
2023 O.Dodin, C.Garcia, L.Jeanjean & D.Parry (2nd)

*RECENT RG "EARLY-RD. TOP PLAYER" WINNERS, w/ FINAL RESULT *
2014 Simona Halep, ROU (RU)
2015 Angelique Kerber, GER (3rd)
2016 Lucie Safarova, CZE (3rd)
2017 Samantha Stosur, AUS (4th)
2018 Elina Svitolina, UKR (3rd)
2019 Karolina Pliskova, CZE (3rd)
2020 Amanda Anisimova, USA (3rd)
2021 Iga Swiatek, POL (QF)
2022 Iga Swiatek, POL (W)
2023 Mirra Andreeva, RUS






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FREE LINK TO ARTICLE




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Whaaaat? You say Monfils *withdrew* after his big 1st Round win that people were comparing to Jimmy Connors' U.S. Open run at age 39 (when he made the semis) and Rafa Nadal (14 RG titles), and used it as an example of why players hold on "past their prime" (when *was* his as player? I'm not quite sure it ever *really* existed). Of course he did.

I mean, it's Monfils. You were expecting an odds-defying, gritty run to the second week?

Actually, I was predicting a retirement during a 2nd Rounder vs. Rune.

Even when you set the bar extremely low...

Meanwhile, this is some world-class level B.S. right here...



As has been the longstanding opinion of this space, Monfils has been and will remain perhaps the most overromanticized, biggest waste of great talent in the history of the sport. One nice comeback win doesn't change that.


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If they ever have a Raducanu "coaches reunion" get-together, they're going to need to rent out Wembley.




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TOP QUALIFIER: Mirra Andreeva/RUS (16; youngest in MD)
TOP EARLY-ROUND (1r-2r): (Q) Mirra Andreeva/RUS (6 games lost in fewest in field; 10 con. sets Q+MD)
TOP MIDDLE-ROUND (3r-QF): xx
TOP LATE-ROUND (SF-F): xx
TOP QUALIFYING MATCH: Q1: #29 Brenda Fruhvirtova/CZE def. Antonia Ruzic/CRO 3-6/6-2/7-6(10) - Ruzic MP in MTB; B.Fruhvirtova qualifies for first RG
TOP EARLY-RD. MATCH (1r-2r): 2nd Rd. - Anna Blinkova/RUS def. #5 Caroline Garcia/FRA 4-6/6-3/7-5 (Garcia saves 8 MP, but Blinkova gets upset on #9)
TOP MIDDLE-RD. MATCH (3r-QF): xx
TOP LATE-RD. MATCH (SF-F/Jr.-WC): xx
=============================
FIRST VICTORY: Magdalena Frech/POL (def. Sh.Zhang)
FIRST SEED OUT: #29 Zhang Shuai/CHN (1r: Frech/POL)
FIRST SLAM MD WINS: M.Andreeva/RUS, Avanesyan/RUS, Grabher/AUT, Navarro/USA, Noskova/CZE, Shymanovich/BLR, Stearns/USA, Waltert/SUI
UPSET QUEENS: ITA
REVELATION LADIES: RUS (11-2 1st Rd.)
NATION OF POOR SOULS: CZE (3-9 1st Rd.; four seeds out 1r; Krejcikova 0-2 since '21 title)
LAST QUALIFIER STANDING: In 3r: M.Andreeva/RUS, Danilovic/SRB, Day/USA, Tauson/DEN
LAST LUCKY LOSER STANDING: Elina Avanesyan/RUS (in 3rd Rd.)
LAST WILD CARD STANDING: Leolia Jeanjean/FRA, Emma Navarro/USA & Diane Parry/FRA (all 2nd Rd.)
PROTECTED RANKING WINS: In 3r: Pavlyuchenkova/RUS, Sorribes Tormo/ESP, Svitolina/UKR
LAST PASTRY STANDING: Oceane Dodin, Caroline Garcia, Leolia Jeanjean & Diane Parry (all 2nd Rd.)
Ms./Mademoiselle OPPORTUNITY: xx
IT "TBD": Nominee: M.Andreeva (teen), Stearns (NCAA), Avanesyan (LL), Day
COMEBACK PLAYER: Nominee: Svitolina, Pavlyuchenkova, Tauson, Day
CRASH & BURN: Barbora Krejcikova/CZE (0-2 since winning '21 title; 24 con. slam WD streak ends)
ZOMBIE QUEEN OF PARIS: Nominees: Andreescu (1r-down 6-2/3-1 vs. Azarenka); Pavlyuchenkova (2r-down 5-2 3rd vs. Samsonova)
DOUBLES STAR: xx
VETERAN PLAYER (KIMIKO CUP): Nominee: Pavlyuchenkova, Begu, Stephens
Mademoiselle/Madame OF THE EVENING: xx
JUNIOR BREAKOUT: xx
Légion de Lenglen HONOREE: xx
Coupe LA PETIT TAUREAU: 20th Anniv. of Justine Henin's first RG title in 2003






All for Day 5. More tomorrow.
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