By Erin Bruehl, USTA.com

REGGIO CALABRIA, Italy - Melanie Oudin was in the player’s locker room on Day Four of the 2009 US Open, fresh off one of the biggest victories of her young career. She had just upset No. 4 seed Elena Dementieva to move into the third round in Flushing Meadows for the first time.

The door opened and in walked Yaroslava Shvedova, a player Oudin had defeated at Wimbledon earlier in the year and someone she had seen at many other tournaments. Shvedova had just pulled off her own upset victory, scoring a three-set win over No. 5 seed Jelena Jankovic to move into her first US Open third round.

As Shvedova walked in, the first person she saw was Oudin and rushed over to greet her.

"She looks at me and says ‘Melanie, you inspired me to win today. I didn’t know if I could do it but after you beat Dementieva, I really believed that I could win. You totally inspired me, you are one of the main reasons I won today, so thank you!'" Oudin said.

In truth, it was hard not to be inspired by Oudin's remarkable run at the Open, a Cinderella story that captivated not only the New York crowd, but the sporting world at large. Oudin entered the US Open as a 17-year-old up-and-comer, and used the great stage of Flushing Meadows as her own coming-out party, upsetting some of women's tennis' top talents, including Maria Sharapova and Nadia Petrova, before falling to eventual finalist Caroline Wozniacki in the quarterfinals.

 

But even in defeat, it was clear that the up-and-comer had arrived, establishing herself as a legitimate contender among the very best in the game. The diminutive two-fisted slugger was indeed a knockout, her tenacious game and irresistible personality lifting her - and the sport of tennis - into a particularly bright spotlight.

Those two weeks at Flushing Meadows proved a life-altering experience for Oudin, who turned 18 just weeks after the close of the Open. Now, the teen talent from Marietta, Ga., enters events with higher expectations - from others, and of herself. Famously, the shoes Oudin wore during the US Open bore the simple exclamation, "Believe." By the end of her run there, she had created a whole new legion of believers.

 

"I think she has a great deal of potential," said Sharapova, after being upset by Oudin in Flushing's third round. "She's smart; she has a game plan, and she sticks to it."

"Getting to the quarterfinals of the US Open was huge for me in terms of confidence," said Oudin. "I am a perfectionist, so losing any time is a disappointment. But the whole experience was something that is going to stay with me forever and is going to take me a long way, I think. I gained a lot of confidence in myself, and I think I proved I belong."

Oudin became the talk of first Wimbledon, where she upset Jankovic and reached the fourth round. After her US Open showing, her ranking zoomed to a career-high of No. 44, and she discovered that her celebrity status was on an equally fast rise. After the Open, Oudin was swamped with appearance requests, showing up on "Ellen," where she played tennis with host Ellen DeGeneres, then chatting up Conan O'Brien on "The Tonight Show." It has been an adjustment for Oudin, as well as her family and friends, getting used to all the new attention, questions and requests. In Georgia, she is now recognized nearly everywhere she goes.

"When I go to restaurants or go out shopping or go out to dinner with my boyfriend people recognize me and they just come up and ask for pictures and autographs. I’m just more recognized," Oudin said. "I draw a lot of attention now, people know who I am. It is just very different, I am not used to that at all.

"It is always very nice, everyone always has nice things to say like, ‘Congratulations, we are proud of you, we were supporting you the whole time,’" she added of the attention from her new fans. "It was just all of a sudden, it happened kind of overnight. I was just not used to any of it and then just of nowhere (this attention happened) when the night before no one knew who I was."

Among some of the attention she has received back home is being invited to throw out the first pitch of an Atlanta Braves game and also receiving an invitation from Atlanta Falcons' owner Arthur Blank to attend a game.

She has also signed multiple endorsement deals since the US Open including with Back Office Associates, a computer software company, and AirTran in addition to her current deals with Adidas and Wilson.

Her boyfriend, Austin Smith, and her family, including twin sister Katherine and younger sister Christina, all have become featured players in Oudin's newfound fame. People across the country now know Smith is her boyfriend who helped design her US Open sneakers with ‘Believe’ stamped on them and that Katherine and Melanie are fraternal twins who are almost complete opposites, except for their love of tennis. During the US Open in fact, Katherine, who plays high school tennis and is off to college next year, wrote a blog for NYTimes.com.

Even with all the changes in her life and career, there still are times when it can feel as if nothing has changed. To Oudin herself, her family, longtime coach Brian de Villiers and close friends, she is and always will be the same Melanie.

"I feel like the same person. My family and friends treat me exactly the same," she said. "My parents and my coach are still so supportive of me and always are there for me, so that has made it easier. Everyone I’ve known for a long time is so normal about it."

 

Oudin especially appreciated that support from friends and family as she endured a post-US Open slump in which she was forced to withdraw from the Quebec City event with an injury, before losing in the qualifying rounds at both the Tokyo and Beijing events. She then lost both of her singles matches in the Fed Cup final against Italy, as the U.S. was swept 4-0.

 

"I am still improving and I am still learning about the game of tennis," Oudin said. "I am working on a lot of different things in my game.

"Everyone has ups and downs. I happened to be up at the US Open and I played really, really well. I was not playing as well right after and I got sick a little bit so maybe going to Asia was not the best idea. But I am ready again and I am going to be ready for next year."

Indeed, her mini-slump has not affected Oudin's determined, fighting spirit, competitiveness nor her up-beat, cheerful demeanor, which can be infectious. She is known for never giving up, as exemplified by her losing the first set during her run at the US Open in three consecutive matches but fighting her way back each time. That was a trend that started for Oudin back in February at Fed Cup. Her yells of "Come on!" throughout matches are as much a trademark for her as her powerful forehand.

U.S. Fed Cup Captain Mary Joe Fernandez selected Oudin for each of the team's three ties in 2009, as the U.S. reached the final for the first time since 2003. In the quarterfinal tie against Argentina in February with the U.S. facing elimination, Oudin came from a set down to defeat Betina Jozami to send the tie to the doubles rubber, which the U.S. won.

"Everybody has seen her fight and courage and she really showed it for the first time when she played in Arizona against Argentina," Fernandez said. "Her personality is contagious and really rubs off on everybody else."

"I think playing well against Jozami helped my confidence big time and that pressure situation there helped me so much at Wimbledon and the US Open," Oudin said. "I was down match points in my first round qualifying match at Wimbledon and I was down a set like every match in New York. But being down did not really phase me at all. I was still playing and fighting hard."
 

For Fernandez, it has been a pleasure to watch Oudin develop from playing in the qualifying rounds of the Australian Open in January to reaching Wimbledon's fourth round, the US Open quarterfinals and the Fed Cup final, where she was the team's No. 1 singles player.

"It has been so much fun watching her because she really stood out in Australia in the qualifying, how much she fought and how well she competed and the attitude she brings to the court is really inspiring for everybody," Fernandez said. "We have seen her grow and mature, improve as a player, a person, get more confident and each and every step along the way. She contributed so much to our Fed Cup team. She was a big part of our success."

"She really is a great girl and deserves everything that is coming her way because she really works hard," she added.

At the Fed Cup final, Oudin was presented with the inaugural Fed Cup by BNP Paribas Heart Award. Fans voted on the winner, the player whom they felt showed exceptional commitment to Fed Cup, courage on the court and represented her country with distinction throughout the year. In winning the award, Oudin won $5,000 for a charity and chose Children’s at Egleston in Marietta, a hospital where Christina had open heart surgery as a young child.

Now 18 years old, Oudin will have no restrictions on how many tournaments she can play in 2010 and at No. 49 in the world, will be able to enter many more tournaments and without having to go through qualifying rounds. Her ranking is more or less guaranteed to remain around where it is now until at least Wimbledon as she does not have too many points to defend until then. Oudin plans to play Hopman Cup and then the tournament in Sydney before the 2010 Australian Open.

"It is so tough doing your schedule when you don’t know if you will be in qualifying or the main draw," Oudin said. "I want to get a lot of points now so when Wimbledon and US Open come around (next year) I don’t have tons of pressure that I have to defend these points or my ranking will go way down."

For 2010, Oudin has goals to become quicker and stronger, knowing her fitness level is something entirely within her control. She also wants to work on improving her serve, including landing more first serves and being more precise with placements. She wants to make the forehand even more of a weapon as well as adding more elements to her game, including coming to net more.

Oudin is convinced those improvements will come, but most important, she is convinced that she has arrived.

"I am finally accepted and getting more respect from the players," she said. "When you are this young kid coming up, you have to prove yourself before other players think you belong here and are a good player.

 

"Now, I think everyone realizes that about me. I know I definitely believe it."