WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 28 , 2019. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ M2 D3
Gauff went from 4-4 to happy
here. She held serve with the help
of a 102-mph service winner at
30-all that went into the corner
and wreaked a harmless popup
return. Then, even though Gauff
would convert only seven of 19
break points to Potapova’s 5-for-5
effort, she had one ready for the
ending.
It went to 15-40 with two
Potapova errors that looked plen-
ty forced and one Gauff cross-
court forehand that looked plen-
ty excellent and yielded a netted
forehand. Then Potapova’s last
shot whirred just long and left
Gauff looking down at that and
then looking up directly at her
parents.
“I think I gave them a heart
attack,” she said, and she ran up
to a handshake between a 15-
year-old and an 18-year-old who
complimented each other pro-
fusely by Gauff ’s account and
hoped the future would bring
further meetings.
“But hopefully in the finals,
not in the first round,” Gauff said,
and it did seem realistic.
[email protected]former track athlete at Florida
State (her mother, Candi).
“Honestly, I just wanted to win
so bad, I was trying to really dig
deep,” Gauff said. “I was like: ‘You
got to make her play. She’s not
going to hand it to you.’ We had a
couple long rallies, then I got
some winners here and there.
Honestly, I mean, I really don’t
remember the match too well
because everything is still a blur.
But I do remember, I think, that
4-all game; it was just like a lot of
battling.”
Much as she held off No. 60
Polona Hercog, 3-6, 7-6 (9-7), 7-5,
in the third round at Wimbledon,From there, Gauff overcame
still more. That included the
medical timeout Potapova took
at 4-1 in the third set for attention
to her shoulder. It included Pota-
pova’s rebound from love-30
through long, solid rallies to hold
for 4-2, and Gauff ’s harrowing
service game croaking with three
double faults for 4-3. By the time
Potapova worked through two
break points and held for 4-4,
Gauff had to reach into her stash
of beyond-her-years moxie.
The stash does seem abundant
within the daughter of a former
college basketball player at Geor-
gia State (her father, Corey) and asomebody born in March 2004
playing a U.S. Open third set in
which she hit eight winners to
her opponent’s two.
Off went the Floridian from
Delray Beach to the second
round Thursday, without even
realizing she would have a day off
before playing 112th-ranked
Hungarian Timea Babos until
on-court interviewer Pam Shriv-
er reminded Gauff of this Grand
Slam fact of life. “I’m still used to
playing juniors; I forgot about
the day off,” Gauff said with a
smile.
“I mean, it was crazy,” she said
in the interview room later. “I
mean, obviously, I was nervous
going out on the court, and I
wanted to do well in my home
Slam.”
She made those truths about
juniors and nerves seem implau-
sible with a comeback against
Potapova, who beat three-time
Grand Slam winner Angelique
Kerber at the French Open, who
ranks No. 72 to Gauff ’s No. 140
and whose early heat dulled
Gauff ’s home-court advantage.
Potapova went up and Gauff ’s
serve went awry, with four dou-
ble faults in the first set, includ-
ing three in an opening service
game that qualified as dreary.
“After the first set, I had to
kind of reset and just stop think-
ing about what will happen after
the match and think about what
happens in the match,” she said,
and she did.
Her expression stayed intent
and polished. She overcame Pota-
pova as well as the U.S. Open’s
renowned capacity for clamor,
from the murmurs of the crowds
at food stands to the screeching
of the subway wheels to the
whistle of the Long Island Rail
Road. Her steadiness gathered as
her opponent’s gave way. Gauff
began to play steady points of
moderate pace, then fantastic
points of every pace as she
claimed 10 of 12 games while she
turned a 3-6, 0-1 deficit into a 3-6,
6-2, 4-1 lead.
“Coco! Coco!” the crowd yelled
as Potapova’s winners often got
claps countable on one hand.
“That was my first match where
people had a chant for me,” Gauff
said, “so that was pretty cool.”
U.S. OPEN FROM D1
Mikhail Kukushkin, 3-6, 6-1, 6-4,
3-6, 6-3, while No. 14 John Isner
and 2014 champion Marin Cilic
each won in straight sets.
Maryland native Frances Tiafoe
advanced when Ivo Karlovic re-
tired in the third set with Tiafoe
leading 6-2, 6-3, 1-2. Tiafoe ad-
vanced to the quarterfinals at the
Australian Open but lost in the
first round at the next two majors.
In other women’s results on Day
2, two-time major champion
Garbiñe Muguruza was eliminat-
ed by Alison Riske of the U.S., 2-6,
6-1, 6-3, while two-time Wimble-
don winner Petra Kvitova and No.
13 seed Belinda Bencic both won
in two sets.
Wimbledon champion Simona
Halep ended her two-match losing
streak at the U.S. Open by defeat-
ing Nicole Gibbs, an American
who was sidelined by cancer earli-
er this year, 6-3, 3-6, 6-2
During the professional era,
which began in 1968, only two U.S.
Open women’s champions have
lost in the first round the follow-
ing year: It happened in 2005 to
Svetlana Kuznetsova and in 2017
to Angelique Kerber — who was
beaten by none other than Osaka,
ranked 45th at the time and yet to
get past the third round at a major
tournament.during a late dispute with chair
umpire Damien Dumusois:
“You’re all weirdos.”
After getting broken to trail 4-3
in the last set of his 6-4, 6-7 (7-5),
7-6 (9-7), 7-5 loss to Andrey Rublev,
Tsitsipas was fiddling around with
a plastic bag of sweat bands and
head wraps at a changeover when
Dumusois announced it was time
for play to resume. Tsitsipas said
he wasn’t ready; Dumusois, essen-
tially, told him that was too bad.
Tsitsipas told the official, who al-
ready had warned him about get-
ting coaching help, to go ahead
and call him for a violation; Du-
musois obliged, docking a point.
“This chair umpire, I don’t
know, he has something against
me. I don’t know why,” said Tsitsi-
pas, who upset Federer en route to
the Australian Open semifinals in
January but bowed out of Wimble-
don in the first round.
No. 4 seed Dominic Thiem, the
two-time French Open runner-up,
was also a first-round loser for the
second straight major tourna-
ment when he was beaten, 6-4,
3-6, 6-3, 6-2, by Thomas Fabbiano
— the player who beat Tsitsipas at
Wimbledon. Another highly seed-
ed man went out when No. 10
Roberto Bautista Agut, a Wimble-
don semifinalist, was defeated byment as her erratic strokes that
presented problems for Osaka,
who finished with 50 unforced
errors, more than double Blinko-
va’s total of 22.
“You kind of want to do well
after you did well last year,” Osaka
said, when asked why she felt so
many jitters while trailing 3-0 and
4-1 at the outset.
“Just definitely,” she said,
“didn’t want to lose in the first
round.”
Osaka avoided that sort of dis-
appointment, as did men’s sec-
ond-seed Rafael Nadal, who
looked dominant in defeating
John Millman, 6-3, 6-2, 6-2.
Nadal, who is undefeated in
U.S. Open first rounds, may have
had reason to worry about Mill-
man, who upset Roger Federer last
year in the fourth round at Flush-
ing Meadows. But the 60th-
ranked Australian could not com-
pete with Nadal from the baseline.
Nadal capped his workmanlike
victory with a clean forehand win-
ner.
Other top men were not as for-
tunate.
Stefanos Tsitsipas, a 21-year-old
from Greece who was seeded No.
8, lost in the first round for the
second Slam in a row — and made
a lot of noise on his way out, sayingASSOCIATED PRESS
new york — Naomi Osaka put
her right hand in the shape of a
gun and pointed two fingers at her
temple, her face grim, while she
looked toward her guest box.
She had just dropped the sec-
ond set, moments after wasting a
match point, as her U.S. Open title
defense got off to a shaky start
Tuesday. Her body language told
the story: the eye rolls, the balled
up fists covering her face at a
changeover, the racket resting
atop her head.
Back in Arthur Ashe Stadium,
where she beat Serena Williams in
last year’s chaotic final, the top-
seeded Osaka kept digging holes
and kept climbing out of them,
eventually emerging with a 6-4,
6-7 (7-5), 6-2 victory over 84th-
ranked Anna Blinkova of Russia in
the first round.
“I don’t think I’ve ever been this
nervous in my life,” Osaka told the
crowd during her post-match in-
terview. “For me, I just came off
really slow and I never really
found my rhythm.”
The 21-year-old from Japan
wore a black sleeve over her left
knee, which has been an issue
recently.
But it wasn’t so much her move-
son said he wouldn’t be surprised
if there are packages that involve
Pigrome.
When asked whether Pigrome’s
role would extend beyond that of a
typical backup quarterback, Lock-
sley said, “If Piggy is one of the five
playmakers in our offensive sys-
tem that week when we start
game-planning, sure, we’ll use
him like we use anybody else and
find situations and roles.”
But for now, Jackson will be the
player occupying the top spot on
the depth chart. The qualities that
earned him the job will soon be
tested in a game setting, and grad-
ually it will become clear whether
Jackson can buck Maryland’s re-
cent painful trend at quarterback.
“I worked all spring and all
summer to earn that job,” Jackson
said. “And I think I can bring
leadership and just hope to be the
best quarterback I can for this
team.”
[email protected]not superstitious and he is “not
trying to focus on the past or
anything.”
For a program hoping to launch
itself into a new and better era,
that’s not a bad strategy. What
Jackson accomplished at Virginia
Tech means little now. He has had
to build new relationships with
teammates and establish himself
as a leader. Even though Locksley
expressed confidence that Jack-
son is the right choice, mitigating
the need for the player to worry
about someone else grabbing the
job, Jackson doesn’t lean on that.
“That still doesn’t mean I can’t
go out there and get pulled,” he
said. “You’ve got to play well.
You’ve got to make the right deci-
sions. You’ve got to take care of the
ball.”
Pigrome will stay involved; that
was part of the conversation Sun-
day. The redshirt junior, who
started two games last year, could
figure into Locksley’s plans. Jack-cates. You see the maturity that he
has, having led an offense before.”
When he agreed to transfer,
Jackson stepped into a program
more known for its laundry list of
injuries at quarterback than any
recent success. After four season-
ending injuries to quarterbacks in
2012, a linebacker started at the
position. Since then, the position
has been a revolving door, with
many players losing the top spot
because of injuries. Pigrome and
Kasim Hill tore ACLs in 2017, and
Hill tore his other ACL the follow-
ing year. (Hill, who started 10
games in 2018, is now at Tennes-
see.)
Jackson can joke now that the
Terrapins’ quarterback injury his-
tory wasn’t part of their recruiting
materials. He didn’t know about it
until he arrived and a trainer told
him.
“So that’s a little disheartening,
I guess you could say,” Jackson
said, laughing. He added that he ishave helped him in camp, that
experience didn’t directly influ-
ence the staff ’s decision. Jackson
started for the Hokies as a redshirt
freshman in 2017, throwing for
2,991 yards and 20 touchdowns
while completing nearly 60 per-
cent of his passes. Jackson added
324 yards and six touchdowns
rushing, but he said Tuesday that
Maryland’s offense requires him
to run less often.
Jackson’s passing yardage from
his first season at Virginia Tech
would rank third on Maryland’s
all-time list, behind Scott
Milanovich (3,499 yards) in 1993
and John Kaleo (3,392) in 1992.
The goal is for Jackson to become
a reliable option who can estab-
lish a passing game that the Terra-
pins lacked in 2018.
“The quarterback position is a
natural leadership position,”
Locksley said. “He’s come in and
he’s done things the right way with
how he works, how he communi-quarterback to lead this offense,
trusted for Saturday’s opener
against Howard and as the season
ventures into its many Big Ten
challenges.
“And it’s not a deal where he has
to look over his shoulder,” Lock-
sley said of Jackson.
The competition was closer
than Locksley expected, with the
level of play at the position rising
and benefiting both players. Jack-
son missed spring practice as he
finished his undergraduate de-
gree in Blacksburg. He didn’t ar-
rive in College Park until the sum-
mer, participating in his first offi-
cial practices at the start of Au-
gust. But by the time the staff had
a large enough sample size to
make a decision, Jackson had
emerged as the player who could
best help the offense extend drives
and score.
Jackson proved himself as a
starter at Virginia Tech, and
though Locksley said that mightBY EMILY GIAMBALVO
Six days before Maryland be-
gins its season — its first game in
this new era, featuring different
schemes and an infusion of talent
by way of transfers — Coach Mi-
chael Locksley sat down with
quarterbacks Josh Jackson and
Tyrrell Pigrome. Pigrome has
been around for a few years, play-
ing sparingly and dealing with a
major injury but progressing
nonetheless. Jackson, like Lock-
sley, joined the program after last
season with the hope that he
would spark the offense.
Sunday’s conversation was
straightforward. Locksley de-
tailed the statistics and evaluation
the staff had compiled for each
player throughout preseason
camp. With both quarterbacks in
the room, Locksley informed
them that Jackson had won the
starting job. The graduate trans-
fer from Virginia Tech will be the
Maryland has known nothing but pain at QB, but Jackson could change that
U.S. OPEN ROUNDUP
Defending champ Osaka survives first-round scare
BY AVA WALLACE
Natasha Cloud began her
night standing at center court
with WNBA legend Dawn Staley
as she received the league’s com-
munity leadership award, which
bears Staley’s name. She ended it
on the bench at Entertainment
and Sports Arena, resting her
body and cheering her team-
mates after she had more than
done her part to secure the
Washington Mystics’ latest blow-
out win, a 95-66 victory over the
Los Angeles Sparks.
Cloud didn’t lead the team in
scoring; that was Aerial Powers,
who had 20 points in 22 minutes
off the bench. But the starting
point guard set the tone for a
surprisingly dominant win by
the first-place Mystics (22-8),
who had expected a playoff-like
battle against a playoff-bound
team. Instead, Washington made
nine three-pointers in the first
half against third-place Los An-
geles (18-11) and got the Sparks
so flustered on defense that they
never recovered.
Tuesday’s result means the
Mystics own a tiebreaker against
Los Angeles, a crucial factor as
the league’s top teams jockey for
position and a double bye in next
month’s playoffs.
“It’s a big statement for us
moving forward,” Cloud said.
“When we came back to practice,
we really talked about the pres-
sure of responsibility that we put
on ourselves.... [Defending the
league’s top spot] is the pressure
that we wanted on ourselves,
and we stepped up to the plate
tonight. I’m proud of everyone.
We really threw the first punch,
and that’s been an emphasis for
us — being able to throw the first
punch and sustain the little jabs
in between.”
Cloud is one of two Mystics
players, along with center
LaToya Sanders, who has started
every game this season, and the
wear of the year is starting to
take a toll: Cloud is playing
through a strained calf, a
jammed finger and an old labral
tear in her hip. Nonetheless, she
had 15 points on one of the best
shooting nights she has had in a
while: 6 for 7 from the floor,
including 3 for 4 from the three-
point line. All three of her deep
balls came in the first quarter,
and they were a critical part of
throwing the Sparks off their
defensive rotations.
“She set a tone,” Mystics
Coach-General Manager Mike
Thibault said. “Tash has obvious-
ly been kind of struggling withher shooting, but [she] got her-
self into a rhythm right away.”
Cloud said the key to breaking
out of her slight scoring slump
was rest. The guard participated
only lightly in practice this
week; she spent time instead on
the massage table and with the
team’s sports psychologist as her
responsibility has ramped up
while starting point guard Kristi
Toliver is out with a bone bruise
on her right knee. Toliver missed
her seventh consecutive game
Tuesday.
Cloud’s flashy first quarter
was made all the better because
she got to do it in front of Staley,
who sat courtside.
“Super huge. For me, I’m from
Philly, so Dawn is a legend,”
Cloud said of the South Carolina
coach. “When I grew up, I was
watching her as well as other
players, whether it was when she
was in the WNBA or at Temple.
So it’s a huge honor; she’s one of
my favorite players and favorite
coaches of all time... especially
to share [the leadership award]
with this community here in D.C.
I love this community; I love this
team. I’ve been here for five
years, so this award by far will
surpass anything I do in my
career.”
Also watching was Wizards
guard Bradley Beal, who took in
his second consecutive Mystics
game. What he saw was a team
that exploited Los Angeles’s
weak perimeter defense.
The Sparks are one of the few
teams in the WNBA that have
both the size and versatility to
match up well against the Mys-
tics, except for in one critical
area: Los Angeles’s three-point
defense is second worst in the
league. Washington feasted from
the three-point line before half-
time, and on defense it stymied a
team that averages nearly 80
points
With Cloud leading the way —
and not missing a shot before
halftime — the Mystics shot 56.8
percent in the first half against a
defense that left their shooters
wide open time and time again.
“We thought that we could get
threes if they were rotating like
they did,” Thibault said. “You
know, it’s tough. If I were playing
against us, it’s the same choices
we had to try to make last year
against Seattle [in the WNBA
Finals]. When everybody’s mak-
ing shots, it’s really hard. We
have players you can’t play one-
on-one.”
The Sparks, meanwhile, were
so often playing catch-up on
defense that they never got the
chance to get in rhythm on the
other end. Candace Parker and
Chelsea Gray each had 12 points
to lead the way.
[email protected]In rout of L.A., Mystics
leave nothing to chance
TONI L. SANDYS/THE WASHINGTON POST
Natasha Cloud received the WNBA’s community leadership award
Tuesday before tallying 15 points and sinking three three-pointers.MYSTICS 95,
SPARKS 66Gau≠ stays steady, makes U.S. Open debut with win
CLIVE BRUNSKILL/GETTY IMAGES
Coco Gauff advanced to a second-round matchup vs. Hungary’s Timea Babos on Thursday in New York.“After the first set, I had to kind of reset
and just stop thinking about what
will happen after the match and think
about what happens in the match.”
Coco Gauff,
on Tuesday’s victory at the U.S. Open