Nestor and Pospisil denied bronze medal

American duo proves too powerful for Canadians in doubles match

A day after Canada’s Daniel Nestor and Vasek Pospisil lost a close match in the men’s doubles semifinals at the Rio Olympics, they were blitzed in the bronzemedal followup, losing 6-2, 6-4 to the American team of Jack Sock and Steve Johnson.

In the process, they confirmed the answer to the age-old question: Do you feel better after a close loss or one when you get walloped?

“It was more emotional yesterday,” Nestor, 43, said after the last match of his sixth and final Olympics. On Thursday, the Canadians lost two tiebreakers to the Spanish team of Rafael Nadal and Marc Lopez. Along the way, they felt they were victimized by a couple of blown calls. “A tough match and a close loss — you know, tough situations in that match,” Nestor said. “Today, it didn’t feel like we had that much of a chance.”

It didn’t look like it, either. The Canadians never managed to get a single break point against their big-serving opponents, while they had several games in which they struggled to hold their serve. Sock and Johnson broke the Canadians twice in the first set and just once in the second, but they had nine break chances in all and the three conversions were enough for a straight-sets win.

“Hats off to them. They played very well,” Toronto’s Nestor said. “They were serving big and putting a lot of pressure on us, and we couldn’t match it.”

Asked if they were still in something of a funk after the Thursday night loss, Nestor dismissed that suggestion. “No, no, not at all,” he said. “We were ready, and they were just better.”

Pospisil, of Vancouver, who won the Wimbledon men’s doubles last year with Sock as his partner, said there wasn’t anything unusual about facing his former teammate.

“It was just somebody I was trying to beat,” he said.

Pospisil plans to play doubles with Nestor for the rest of this ATP season, including in Cincinnati next week as a tune-up for the U.S. Open.

For Nestor, with more than two decades of tennis and more than 1,000 match wins behind him, he wasn’t ready on Friday night to put all of his Olympic experience in perspective. Yes, he won doubles gold 16 years ago in Sydney, but it was no time for reminiscing.

“I’m not really thinking about that right now,” he said. “It’s kind of upsetting being in fourth place, being in a medal position yesterday and now we’re walking away with nothing.”

A second medal would have been a lovely bookend to his career. But that’s not why they give them out.