C2 Sports The Boston Globe FRIDAY, AUGUST 30, 2019
By Howard Fendrich
ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK — The pure, raw emo-
tion from Taylor Townsend came
through after she delivered one last
crisp forehand volley to complete her
US Open upset of two-time major
champion Simona Halep, then
clenched her fists, raised her arms and
yelled, ‘‘Yes! Yes!’’ before patting her
heart.
And there it was again, moments
later, when Townsend’s voice cracked
and tears began to flow as she told the
Arthur Ashe Stadium crowd, ‘‘I mean,
this means a lot. It’s been a long jour-
ney. Just haven’t been able to get over
the hump.’’
Make way for another young Amer-
ican woman making Grand Slam
waves. Townsend, a 23-year-old quali-
fier ranked 116th, pulled off the big-
gest victory of her up-and-down career
with an entertaining, net-rushing,
serve-and-volleying brand of lefty ten-
nis Thursday, surprising former No. 1
Halep, 2-6, 6-3, 7-6 (7-4), in the second
round at Flushing Meadows.
‘‘I just told myself this is an oppor-
tunity,’’ Townsend said. ‘‘It’s a chance,
and you have nothing to lose.’’
She was able to put aside the early
deficit of a set. And get over that she
wasted a pair of match points, one via
double-fault, while serving for the win
at 5-4 in the third. And steady herself
nearly 15 minutes later, when Halep,
who won Wimbledon in July and was
seeded No. 4 at the US Open, was a
single point from winning this thing
herself at 6-5.
Coco Gauff at 15 became the
youngest player to reach the US Open’s
third round since 1996, quickly prov-
ing her captivating run to the fourth
round at Wimbledon last month in her
Grand Slam debut was no fluke.
And what a showdown comes next:
Gauff will face No. 1 seed and defend-
ing champion Naomi Osaka on Satur-
day. Earlier Thursday, Osaka beat
Magda Linette, 6-2, 6-4, with a couple
of famous fans in her courtside guest
seats: Colin Kaepernick and Kobe Bry-
ant.
‘‘This is just the beginning, I prom-
ise,’’ Gauff told an appreciative crowd
that chanted her name at Louis Arm-
strong Stadium during a 6-2, 4-6, 6-4
win over Timea Babos of Hungary.
‘‘I was tested a lot. I think we were
both just testing each other,’’ Gauff
said. ‘‘If I didn’t win that last point,
maybe she would have won the
match.’’
Townsend was marked for great-
ness long ago: She was the singles and
doubles junior champion at the 2012
Australian Open, turned pro later that
year at age 16, then cracked the top
100 in the rankings while still a teen-
ager. But there have been plenty of ups
and downs since, including a drop out
of the WTA’s top 300, a 9-16 record at
Grand Slam tournaments and an 0-10
mark against top-10 foes.
Townsend never let up and never
gave up Thursday, even though she
knew full well she lost all six sets the
two women had contested previously.
‘‘When I’ve played her before, I was
just trying to make balls [in]. I think I
played not to lose,’’ Townsend said.
‘‘And today I played to win.’’
How did she do it?
By moving forward at every oppor-
tunity, something so rarely seen these
days on tour. She won the point on 64
of her 106 trips to the net; Halep went
6 for 10. And Townsend serve-and-vol-
leyed 61 times, Halep once.
It was an attention-grabbing result
on a busy day at the year’s last major
tournament, with all but nine of
Wednesday’s scheduled singles match-
es carried over because of rain. The
weather was just right Thursday, and
so result after result poured in, includ-
ing Andrea Petkovic’s 6-4, 6-4 elimina-
tion of two-time Wimbledon champi-
on Petra Kvitova and No. 19 seed Caro-
line Wozniacki holding off American
Danielle Collins, 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, to ad-
vance to the third round.
Among the men, Nick Kyrgios had
a relatively easy victory in his first
match since saying the ATP was ‘‘cor-
rupt,’’ beating Antoine Hoang, 6-4, 6-2,
6-4, to reach the third round. Unseed-
ed American Denis Kudla beat No. 27
Dusan Lajovic, 7-5, 7-5, 0-6, 6-3, and
unseeded Briton Daniel Evans topped
No. 25 Lucas Pouille, 6-4, 6-3, 6-7
(7-4), 6-4.
Three-time US Open champion Ra-
fael Nadal reached the third round
when his opponent, Thanasi Kokkina-
kis, withdrew with an injured right
shoulder.
Townsend now will try to get to the
fourth round at a Slam for the first
time.
Kaepernick, the former San Fran-
cisco 49ers quarterback who three
years ago began kneeling during the
national anthem at his team’s games,
has been working out in the New York
area in hopes of getting another shot
in the NFL. Bryant, the retired NBA
superstar, came to the US Open to pro-
mote a new book. Osaka said this was
the first time she’d met Kaepernick;
she shares a sponsor with Bryant.
‘‘It’s just funny to me,’’ Osaka said.
‘‘You know, like, last year compared to
this year, there is no way, like, Kobe
would sit in my box. Yeah, Kaepernick,
too.’’KENA BETANCUR/AFP/GETTY IMAGESAmerican qualifier Taylor Townsend got emotional after finishing her
stunning upset of two-time major winner Simona Halep in three sets.
impressive, the 67-year-old soccer
lifer is conducting one of the best
stories of the New England summer,
positioning himself to finally bring
the Revolution into the true Boston
sports fold.
“They’re winners,” Arena says lat-
er, over salads at Tavolino at nearby
Patriot Place.
“How do I know? I watched the
Red Sox beat the Yankees, I follow
basketball, hockey, it’s all there. And
I happen to be working for owners
who own the most successful fran-
chise in the history of the NFL.
There’s something there.”
And now he’s here, drawn by that
very tradition of winning, driven to
make the Revolution worthy mem-
bers of the local landscape.
Make no mistake: Arena is a win-
ner too. Five MLS titles with two dif-
ferent franchises in D.C. and Los An-
geles, five NCAA titles (including
four in a row) at Virginia, and a win-
ning tenure with the US national
team that includes a stirring run to
the 2002 World Cup quarterfinals
separate him from the small pack of
influencers on a sport that demands
its leaders don’t simply coach the
game, but grow it too.
By all rights, he could have been
done, legacy secure, living happily in
California, where his son Kenny is
an assistant to his close friend and
fellow coaching icon Bob Bradley for
Los Angeles FC. He had plenty of
overtures elsewhere, but then the
Revolution reached out, and Arena
was intrigued. His brain started
churning, listening to an offer to ba-
sically do everything from the front
office to the field.
How many more chances like thisuSULLIVAN
Continued from Page C1would he get? How much longer
should he listen to the inner voice in-
sisting he was ready to retire to the
golf course? How much could it
mean to burnish an already amazing
résumé with one more challenging
turnaround? Ultimately, he opted
for one more swing at a job he’s
proven over and over again he’s one
of the best ever to do.
“It was Kenny who said it to me,
‘You’ve got to do it. That’s what you
do,’ ” Arena says. “I think when you
coach your whole career, once you
start doing it, you’re right back in it
right away. You enjoy it. I enjoy this.
I don’t necessarily enjoy having to
move again and all that crap, but
this is what I do.”
How he does it is difficult to
quantify, but much of it is rooted in
an honest, direct, and respectful ap-
proach with players and an uncanny
ability to work with the skill set they
have rather than force a prescribed
framework over them. Those tenets
make it clear why he wasn’t quick to
take the coaching reins right away,
needing some time to evaluate not
only what was happening on the
field, but what the franchise-wide ef-
forts were like off it too.
But once he dipped his toe in the
pool, he knew he’d be better off
jumping in.
“I sensed that it was a group of
players that wanted to be coached,”
he says. “I think they were better
than they had played.”
The results have proven him
right, and with an enormous game
Saturday against fellow playoff
hopeful Toronto FC, the playoff pic-
ture will soon become clearer. But
given what expectations were when
he arrived — “I came in thinking this
season, don’t even worry about it, itwas done,” he admits — the excite-
ment is growing for the future as
well as the present. The team’s new
training facility is set to open within
weeks, complete with new offices,
two fields (one heated), and a com-
munity dining room with one large
team table.
The real prize is more than a few
years away, the promise of a down-
town soccer stadium positively light-
ing up Arena’s eyes with the crowds
and energy it could draw to the city.
As Arena recalls how Kraft said to
him in a clinching phone call, “We’ll
support you, we want this thing to
be successful,” he can see how he’ll
help make it happen.
“A couple of things were impor-
tant to me,” he says. “One, I want to
be in a major city. Two, it can only go
up here, they had the worst team in
the league. Three, they committed
they were going to build a soccer sta-
dium. And fourth, you need an influ-
ential owner, and I like having a lo-
cal owner.
“Listen, what I should be able to
do here is get this headed in the
right direction by the time they get a
stadium. That is my goal.”
I wouldn’t doubt him. It was in
the first few moments of sitting
down to lunch when I began an
opening question meant to get to the
heart of his decision to do this. He
stopped me before I could finish.
“ ‘What the hell are you doing
here?’ ” he laughs. “That is the real
question.”
He answers it himself: It’s what
he does.Tara Sullivan is a Globe columnist.
She can be reached at
[email protected]. Follow
her on Twitter @Globe_Tara.By Nicole Yang
BOSTON.COM STAFF
The quest for a gold medal begins
Sunday in Shanghai for the two-time
defending FIBA World Cup champi-
on United States basketball team.
The competition will be fiercer
than in years past, given the large
contingent of US players opting to
withdraw from participation. All-
Stars Bradley Beal, Anthony Davis,
James Harden, and Damian Lillard
highlight the list of those who backed
out prior to training camp, but USA
Basketball managing director Jerry
Colangelo has said any perceived de-
cline in talent for the US is not a con-
cern.
“These are not ‘C’ players,” Colan-
gelo said on the first day of practice.
“You’ve heard a lot of criticism about
who isn’t here, and I keep repeating
that it’s about who is here. There’s
some really good talent.”
Celtics point guard Kemba Walk-
er, the only player on the final 12-
man roster to earn All-NBA honors
last season, never wavered from his
commitment to the team. The 29-
year-old expressed excitement about
the opportunity to represent the US,
which could become the first nation
to win three straight FIBA World Cup
titles.
“It means the world to me,” Walk-
er said. “We know a lot of the big-
name guys pulled out, but it’s given
the younger guys a chance to show-
case what they have. We’re all so ex-
cited to be here. This is something we
all grew up watching and we all grew
up wanting to be a part of.”
Walker will be joined on the court
by new Celtic teammates Jaylen
Brown, Marcus Smart, and Jayson
Tatum. Harrison Barnes (Sacramento
Kings), Joe Harris (Brooklyn Nets),
Brook Lopez (Milwaukee Bucks),
Khris Middleton (Milwaukee Bucks),
Donovan Mitchell (Utah Jazz), Ma-
son Plumlee (Denver Nuggets), Myles
Turner (Indiana Pacers), and Derrick
White (San Antonio Spurs) round out
the rest of Team USA.
Here’s what to know as games get
underway Friday.Celticstowatch
RBrown:Leading up to the tour-
nament, Brown voiced an interest in
being more aggressive when attack-
ing the rim. The 22-year-old seems to
have made good on his intention,
demonstrating an improvement in
playing through contact and creating
space around the hoop. In Team
USA’s exhibition win over Canada on
Monday, Brown finished with a
team-high 19 points on 8-for-11
shooting in 19 minutes off the bench.
Through four exhibition games, his
field-goal percentage is an impressive
71.4 and his individual net rating isplus-24.6. Set to hit free agency next
summer, Brown is kicking off his
contract year with a promising bang.
RSmart:Dealing with calf tight-
ness, Smart was sidelined for the ma-
jority of training camp practices as
well as the first two exhibition
games. He returned to action against
Australia on Saturday and logged
nine minutes in the losing effort.
Through two games, Smart’s scoring
has been classically underwhelming
— two field goals (one of which was a
three) and two free throws for 7
points — but the 25-year-old has nev-
ertheless displayed the beauty of his
game. Against Canada, he dished a
nifty no-look bounce pass to Brown
and also dived for a steal after help-
ing poke the ball away. As Smart gets
more acclimated, the hope is that he
can balance distributing and creating
his own offense, especially if fellow
ball-handlers Walker and/or Mitchell
are on the bench.
“I can go out there and try and
score 30, but for me, it’s about doing
whatever the team needs,” Smart
said. “I think that’s a bigger role than
being a prominent scorer because
not a lot of guys are willing to sacri-
fice their individual stats for the
team.”
RTatum:Tatum was responsible
for one of Team USA’s more viral
highlights, breaking out a windmill
dunk against Canada. His training
camp got off to a strong start, as he
scored 17 points on 6-for-8 shooting
in an intrasquad scrimmage. Out of
the four Celtics, however, he seems to
be struggling a bit to find his shot in
exhibition play. Through four games,
Tatum is shooting a team-worst 31.4
percent (11 for 35) from the field and
averaging 8.3 points.
RWalker:One of the de facto cap-
tains, Walker has recorded the most
playing time out of any player. As a
primary ball-handler, he has been
central to Team USA’s offense, aver-
aging a team-high 17 points on 46.9
percent shooting. Walker also has
reached the free-throw line a team-
high 19 times and dished out a team-
high 13 assists, showing off his crafti-ness and quickness. In addition to
putting up notable numbers, Walker
said he’s “trying to be as positive as
possible.”
“I am trying to bring the energy,
bring the enthusiasm and excite-
ment,” he said. “I am one of the older
guys on the team — I am not trying
to overdo the leadership thing — but
if anyone asks me for some type of
advice or voice my opinion, I will.”
The time with Team USA also has
been an opportunity for Walker to
becomemorecomfortablewithhis
new Celtics teammates. The shared
experiences can help facilitate a
smooth transition once the season
starts, he said.
“I’m all about the togetherness,”
Walker said. “I’ve always felt that
your off-the-court relationships
translate on the court.”
ROthers:New Celtics center Vin-
cent Poirier is a member of France’s
national team, and center Daniel
Theis is a member of Germany’s na-
tional team. Ex-Celtics center Aron
Baynes, who was traded to the Phoe-
nix Suns this offseason, is a part of
Australia’s national team.TeamUSA’sschedule
RGroupstage:Sunday, vs. Czech
Republic (8:30 a.m. EDT); Tuesday,
vs. Turkey (8:30 a.m.); Thursday, vs.
Japan (8:30 a.m.).
RSecondround:Sept. 6-9.Quar-
terfinals:Sept. 10-11.Semifinals:
Sept. 13.Bronze-medalgame:Sept.
14.Gold-medalgame:Sept. 15. (All
games will be streamed on ESPN+.)
RThecompetition: Team USA’s
biggest threat probably is Serbia,
whom they faced in the gold-medal
match of the 2016 Summer Olym-
pics. Not only does Serbia’s roster in-
clude center Nikola Jokic — the tour-
nament’s second-best player behind
Greece’s Giannis Antetokounmpo —
it also boasts six players listed as 6
feet 10 inches or taller. That size
could present a problem.
France, with five NBA players;
Greece, with Antetokounmpo; and
Spain, with its experience, are other
potential options to upset the US.USOPEN
Townsendstuns
No.4seedHalep
Wimbledon champ
upset in three sets
Boston’ssuccessattractedArena
WORLDCUPBASKETBALLCeltics’flavortoUSteam
Energetic Walker
playing a lead role
Celtics guard
Kemba Walker
(left) is a
veteran leader
for coach Gregg
Popovich’s
United States
basketball
team.MARCIO JOSE SANCHEZ/ASSOCIATED PRESSTHURSDAY’S KEY RESULTS
Men’ssingles— Rafael Nadal (2) def. Thanasi Kokkinakis, retired; Daniil Medvedev (5) def. Hu-
go Dellien,6-3, 7-5, 5-7, 6-3; Alexander Zverev (6) def. Frances Tiafoe, 6-3, 3-6, 6-2, 2-6, 6-3; David
Goffin (15) def. Gregoire Barrere, 6-2, 6-2, 6-2; John Isner (14) def. Jan-Lennard Struff, 6-3, 7-6 (4),
7-6 (7-5).
Women’ssingles— Naomi Osaka (1) def. Magda Linette, 6-2, 6-4; Taylor Townsend def. Simona
Halep (4), 2-6, 6-3, 7-6 (7-4); Andrea Petkovic def. Petra Kvitova (6), 6-4, 6-4; Kiki Bertens (7) def.
Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, 7-5, 6-4.; Yulia Putintseva def. Aryna Sabalenka (9), 6-3, 7-6 (3); Caro-
line Wozniacki (19) def. Danielle Collins, 4-6, 6-3, 6-4; Cori Gauff def. Timea Babos, 6-2, 4-6, 6-4.
FRIDAY’S FEATURED MATCHES
(TV: noon, ESPN; and 6 p.m., ESPN2)
Men’s singles— Novak Djokovic (1) vs. Denis Kudla; Roger Federer (3) vs. Dan Evans; Stan
Warwrinka (23) vs. Pablo Lorenzi; Danill Medvedev (5) vs. Feliciano Lopez; Kei Nishikori (7) vs. Al-
ex de Minaur.
Women’ssingles— Maria Sakkari (30) vs. Ashleigh Barty (2); Ons Jabeur vs Karolina Pliskova
(3); Elina Svitolina (5) vs. Dayana Yastremska (32); Serena Williams (8) vs. Karolina Muchova; An-
astasija Sevastova (12) vs. Petra Martic (22); Sofia Kenin (20) vs. Madison Keys (10).USOpenataglance