Atherton teen Bellis to face Venus in Bank of the West quarters
Atherton 17-year-old once faced Serena, will now take on Venus
STANFORD — In late March of 2015, Atherton’s CiCi Bellis got the teenage thrill of a lifetime when she made it to the third round of the Miami Open at age 15 and got to play the topranked woman in tennis, Serena Williams.
Bellis doesn’t recall too many details about it, and for good reason. She lost 61, 6-1 in just 41 minutes, with Williams winning 51 of 65 points and losing only two points on her serve.
But now at a slightly more seasoned 17, Bellis will be getting a bookend rare opportunity. With a 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 victory over fellow American Sachia Vickery on Thursday at Stanford’s Taube Family Tennis Center, she earned the right Serena’s older sister, topseeded Venus Williams, in the quarterfinals of the Bank of the West Classic.
Bellis, who lives just five minutes away from the Stanford campus, will be playing in the 7 p.m. feature match Friday against a player more than twice her age, but a woman who herself once made teenage headlines when she made her pro debut in Oakland at age 14. That was way back in 1994, nearly five years before Bellis was born. Venus is 36.
“That’s pretty weird,” Bellis said, chuckling.
It’s also pleasantly strange that while still retaining her amateur status, Bellis has the honor of being able to play both Williams sisters so early in her fledgling career. That honor is not lost on her.
“They’ve been doing it for so long and they’re still doing it at their age,” she said. “To play against both them, when you really think about it, that’s so cool at my age. I mean, I can’t even believe it.”
It’ll be a far cry from the 2-hour, 15-minute match Bellis played against the 21year-old Vickery, a friend and a frequent opponent when the two played as juniors. They came into their second-round match ranked Nos. 203 and 204 in the world, respectively, and the closeness of their match reflected that until Bellis found an extra gear with the score tied 3-3 in the third set, winning the final three games on the strength of two service breaks.
But now she gets the No. 7 player in the world, a distinct jump up in class. She isn’t quite sure what to think about her chances, only that she hopes it goes a little bit better than it did against Serena. Asked for her reflections on that match, she was brutally honest about her memory of it.
“It was so quick I don’t remember that much,” Bellis said. “But hopefully it’s a little bit longer tomorrow. Hopefully, I’ll get a couple more games. If not, what can I do? But I don’t think I’ll be as nervous as I was playing against Serena in Miami. I’m a little more used to it now.”
Indeed, since getting thrashed by Serena, Bellis added a major feat to her resume, becoming the youngest player in 30 years to win a match at the U.S. Open last summer, when she beat 12th-ranked Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia in the opening round. Interestingly, Cibulkova is the second seed in the Bank of the West and won her match over Poland’s Urzsula Radwanska Thursday 7-6 (3), 6-3.
A win over Williams would be Bellis’ first over a top 10 player in the Women’s Tennis Assn. (WTA) rankings. She said she and her coach would work out a strategy and hope for the best. If there’s one thing she knows she has to improve on from her match with Vickery, it’s her serving. Her first-serve percentage was under 50 percent for the first two sets, when she was broken four times. She improved to 66 percent in the third set, and won all three of her service games.
However it goes, Bellis is going to give it her best shot.
“It’s not going to be easy, but I don’t think anything’s impossible,” she said. “Obviously, it’s going to be such an honor to play one of the best players of all time. She’s done so much in her career and is still doing amazing things, so it’s going to be really fun. I’m really excited.”
In other second-round matches, fourth-seeded CoCo Vandeweghe of Rancho Santa Fe rallied from a lopsided first set loss to defeat former Stanford star Nicole Gibbs 2-6, 6-4, 6-2. Vandeweghe will play fellow American Alison Riske in Friday’s quarterfinals. Riske upended Romania’s Ana Bogdan 3-6, 6-2, 6-4. Cibulkova will play No. 5 seed Misaki Doi of Japan while third seed Johanna Konta meets Saisai Zheng of China.
There have been 12 threeset singles matches in the first two rounds, the most in the Bank of the West in more than 35 years.