First held in August of 1881, now wrapping up its 143rd year running, the US Open showcased two weeks of fantastic tennis finishing on Sunday, Sept. 8 with the men’s singles final. The US Open is the finale of four yearly Grand Slam Tournaments, which are the biggest tennis tournaments a player can participate in. The Grand Slams are always full of incredible tennis, shocking wins, and wonderful moments, and the Open this year was no exception.
This year’s Open was full of surprises due to the fact that almost every top seeded player lost early in the tournament. Defending women’s champion Coco Gauff lost in the round of 16, defending men’s champion Novak Djokovic lost in the 3rd round, #1 women’s seed Iga Świątek lost in the quarter finals, #2 men’s seed Carlos Alcaraz lost in the second round, and #4 women’s seed Elena Rybakina pulled out due to injury after the first round. So the title was up for grabs by anyone.
Starting on Aug. 19, the top half of both singles draws starts and players compete to move on to round 2. On Aug. 20, the bottom half of the draws do the exact same thing. Players continue this “one day on, one day off” play schedule until the semi-finals, where the women’s draw plays on one day and then the men’s draw plays on the day after.
The women’s semi-final matches were exciting because both semi final matches had an American player vying for a position in the final. Emma Navarro (US) played in her first major semi-final against #2 seed Aryna Sabalenka and lost 3-6, 6-7(2). Jessica Pegula (US) similarly played in her first major semi-final against Karolína Muchová (CZE) and she was able to pull out a win . After losing the first set, Pegula locked in and convincingly won the next 2 sets with a final score of 1-6, 6-4, 6-2. Pegula and Sabalenka went on to play in the finals on Sept. 7, with Sabalenka winning in straight sets 7-5, 7-5.
The men’s semi-finals also consisted of two Americans but unfortunately Taylor Fritz and Frances Tiafoe were on the same side of the draw and had to battle each other in the semi finals so that only one of them could advance to the finals. Fritz came out on top in the semi’s, winning a thrilling 5 setter 4-6, 7-5, 4-6, 6-4, 6-1. This was the first time an American has been in the US Open finals since 2006. On the other side of the draw, world #1 Jannik Sinner (ITA) played 25th seed Jack Draper (GBR) and Sinner won 7-5, 7-6(3), 6-2. In the final on Sunday September 8th, Sinner beat Taylor Fritz 6-3, 6-4, 7-5 in the final.
On Aug. 28, all the doubles draws began (men’s, women’s, and mixed) in the same format as the singles schedule of play, i.e., top half of the draw one day, bottom half the next. The finals of the men’s doubles was on Sep. 7, between Max Purcell/Jordan Thompson (AUS) and Kevin Krawietz/Tim Pütz (GER), with Purcell/Jordan coming out with a 6-4, 7-6(4) straight set win.
On Sep. 6, Jeļena Ostapenko (LAT)/Lyudmyla Kichenok (UKR) and Kristina Mlademovic (FRA)/Zhang Shuai (CHN) battled it out for rights to the women’s doubles title. Ostapenko/Kichenok won 6-4, 6-3. On Sep. 5, the mixed doubles final was held between Donald Young/Taylor Townsend (US) and Sara Errani/Andrea Vavassori (ITA), after a very close match of 7-6(0), 7-5, Errani/Vavassori were crowned 2024 mixed doubles champions.
The US Open this year consisted of many firsts for a great number of players. There was a ton of incredible tennis with some big upsets early in the tournament. It will be exciting to see how these players take the lessons they learned into the upcoming tournaments.
