WHAT AN UPSET
Serena Williams had a shot at a calendar Grand Slam on Friday, but wound up losing to an unknown Italian who “played literally out of her mind.”
And that is why calendar Grand Slams don’t happen very often.
Up a set against an unseeded 32-year-old playing in her first-ever major semifinal, Serena Williams collapsed against Roberta Vinci, losing her bid for the Slam on the hard court at the U.S. Open.
Vinci’s 2-6, 6-4, 6-4 victory was, simply, one of the greatest upsets in sports history. Was there a point when she knew she had a chance to win?
“Never,” she said afterward. “Never.” Vinci said she had already booked a flight home for Saturday.
Time and again in her charge through the 2015 season, Williams had wobbled on the way to history, but she had always righted herself. Three times at the French Open she dropped the opening set before pulling out a win. She did the same thing early at Wimbledon, and saved match points later in that tournament after dropping a second set. She already had two comeback wins in New York.
But she couldn’t do it a third time. Vinci, despite looking completely overmatched at points during the contest, won the crucial points when the outcome was still in doubt in the third set. And when everyone in the tennis world expected the roaring Serena comeback to happen, it didn’t. With Vinci serving for the match in the third set, Williams returned a weak second serve into the net. On another second serve, the kind of puffball that Serena was destroying earlier in the match, she hit her return wide.
Suddenly, Vinci was about to put an end to the Grand Slam bid. She ended up doing it with a routine volley, like hitting cheeky shots against the best player in the world was a totally natural thing. And then she cried.
Vinci, whose previous majors this year included two first-round exits and a second-round loss, will now play another Italian, Flavia Pennetta, in the final on Saturday. A 300-to-1 underdog at some betting houses, she said afterward that she didn’t really have a plan to win. There was no roadmap to victory, no scenario that she thought would allow her to pull the match out against someone who had only lost two matches all season.
“Put the ball in the court and run,” is how she described her strategy. Hit shots, hope for the best.
It was just enough. Williams, who has insisted throughout this tournament that she did not feel any extra pressure to complete the calendar Slam, held to that line when the match was over.
She was rather defiant about it. “I told you guys that I don’t feel pressure,” she said. “I never felt that pressure to win here. I said that from the beginning.” Williams would not allow that it was an inability to cope that caused her to lose. Asked if she was tight in the later stages, Williams said: “I mean, I made a couple of tight shots, to be honest, but maybe just about two.” She gave all credit to Vinci: “She played literally out of her mind,” Williams said.
But while Williams can insist that she didn’t bend at the wrong moment, the evidence suggests otherwise. The first set went about as you would expect of one pitting someone who had won 21 Grand Slams against someone in her first Slam semi: Serena dominated, ripping 16 winners against just three for Vinci. The world number one made only eight unforced errors in the set, matching Vinci. The Italian looked like she would need weapons that she did not possess. Williams was jumping on her second serve, and Vinci was just hanging around in Serena’s service games. Even when some poor serving caused Williams to lose a service game and the second set, it didn’t seem like a real threat. She was bound to get the break of Vinci she needed in the final.
She got it right away. And then sports happened.
Williams double-faulted to give back a service break. Serving at 3-3, she double faulted twice more to fall behind. She rallied to take the lead in the game, but hit a volley into the net on game point. And then, on the match’s wildest point, Vinci ran from here to the East River to chase down several balls, saving the game on the way to getting a crucial break to lead 4-3. When that point was over, she cocked her hand behind her ear, exhorting the crowd at Arthur Ashe Stadium that had been openly rooting against her.
Put ball in court, run, she had said. Done and done.
Williams had two more opportunities to break Vinci’s serve, but she couldn’t finish the points when she had chances for winners. A ball would sail long, another would float wide. She would make 19 unforced errors in the third set — more than double of those in the opener.
Was it nerves? Tension? Something can happen to the elite athlete in those rare instances when the focus, even just for a moment, is clouded by thoughts of history, and of legacy.
The Serena Williams of 2015 doesn’t drop killshots into the net. She doesn’t hit balls wide when the game is on her racquet. She wavered just a bit on Friday. And then it was over.
Despite her protestations, was some part of her contemplating the Slam, even as it was slipping away? Did she try to grab it too tight, when she needed to be loose?
Vinci said she thought her opponent, late in the third set, was fighting her nerves. She could see it, even if Serena couldn’t.
This is why it isn’t easy to make history.
“Today is my day,” Vinci said afterward, having wiped the tears from her eyes. She gave the crowd at Ashe a shrug. “Sorry, guys,” she said.