Wimbledon Day 3: Opelka Stands Tall

Reilly Opelka is playing the main draw at Wimbledon for the first time in his young career, though you wouldn’t know it based on how he looked in his second-round upset of three-time Grand Slam champion Stan Wawrinka. The 21-year-old from Palm Coast, Fla., outlasted the No. 22 seed, 7-5, 3-6, 4-6, 6-4, 8-6, Wednesday to advance to the third round at the All England Club.

The 6-foot-11 Opelka, who won his first ATP title earlier this year at the New York Open, is no stranger to success at Wimbledon – he won the 2015 Junior Wimbledon tournament at age 17.

Wednesday’s match, which lasted 3 hours, 13 minutes, was only the third five-setter of Opelka’s career – he had been 0-2 in such matches. Wawrinka, meanwhile, was playing in his 49^th five-set match (he’s now 27-22).

“He got really comfortable and started hitting some really good returns,” Opelka said during the post-match press conference. “I had to adjust a lot. My mind was always thinking, especially after I lost the third set. I knew I had to make some adjustments quick to start, because he was in every return game… Today we went through a match where he had break points, like, almost every game.”

Opelka praised Wawrinka for his adjustment to the big serve. He said he was hoping to stick with a serve-and-volley attack, but the 34-year-old Swiss wouldn’t let him do that.

“He was killing me,” Opelka said. “He was starting to return really well. He was putting a lot of balls at my feet … As he kind of picked up on what I was doing, reading my serve a little bit, it was more difficult for me to win points at the net. So I played a lot of tennis from the baseline today.”

Opelka made 23 aces in the victory. His booming serve topped out at 142 mph.

“Against those big servers you know you’re not going to have a lot of chances,” said Wawrinka. “You know you need to be sharp … At the end, he was being more aggressive. He deserved to win.”

Next up for Opelka in the third round is No. 15 seed Milos Raonic of Canada.

In all, seven Americans competed in singles action Wednesday at Wimbledon – five women and two men. The other American in the men's competition was Denis Kudla, who lost to No. 1 seed and defending champion Novak Djokovic.

On the women’s side, Cori “Coco” Gauff continued to be the trending story at Wimbledon. The 15-year-old phenom advanced to the third round with a 6-3, 6-3 victory over Magdalena Rybarikova of Slovakia. Gauff showed no signs of letdown after her emotional victory Monday against her idol, Venus Williams.

Gauff’s next opponent will be Slovenia’s Polona Hercog, who upset Madison Keys Wednesday.

Danielle Collins defeated Latvia’s Anastasija Sevastova, the tournament’s No. 12 seed, 4-6, 6-4, 6-3.

American women who lost Wednesday were Keys, Madison Brengle and Sofia Kenin.

In ladies’ doubles, American Nicole Melichar and Kveta Peschke of the Czech Republic, the No. 7 seed, defeated Magda Linette and Irina Bara, 7-5, 6-2. American Desirae Krawczyk and Giuliana Olmos of Mexico defeated Alexa Guarachi and Sabrina Santamaria, 3-6, 6-3, 7-5.

In men’s doubles, American Rajeev Ram and Salisbury of the United Kingdom, the No. 12 seeds, defeated and Radu Albot and Malek Jaziri, 6-3, 6-4, 6-2.   

American women playing singles action Thursday will be seven-time Wimbledon champion Serena Williams, Sloane Stephens, Lauren Davis, Amanda Anisimova, Taylor Townsend and Alison Riske.

American men in singles action on Thursday will be John Isner, Sam Querrey, Taylor Fritz, Tennys Sandgren and Steve Johnson.