Michael Zheng spent years making the long trek from northern New Jersey, first by bus across the Hudson River to the Port Authority bus terminal and then nearly the full length of the No 7 subway line, all for the opportunity to train at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. On a rainswept Wednesday afternoon in Queens, the destination was the same but the purpose had changed entirely.
The 22-year-old American wildcard and two-time NCAA champion from nearby Columbia University brushed aside Hungary’s Fabian Marozsan 6-4, 6-4, 6-2 to win his rain-interrupted US Open debut, providing one of the more unlikely highlights on a busy day for the home contingent in New York.
Playing before a vocal crowd of his college teammates and alumni who splashed the intimate confines of Court 10 with blue and white, Zheng needed only 1hr 51min to dispatch of the world No 63, breaking five times and dropping serve only once. He hit nearly twice as many winners (33) as unforced errors (17) and was especially ruthless on his first serve, winning all but three of 39 points (92.3%) over three sets.
“It just felt like a college tennis match, really,” Zheng said. “My teammates came out. They had the ‘Let’s go, Michael’ chants, and I’m not sure my opponent was ready for it.”
He added: “This is a place I grew up training. It was one of the first places that I kind of called home base, actually, the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. So it’s really special to get that first main-draw win here and in front of my family, friends and teammates as well.”
Long before Wednesday’s win, Zheng was a 10-year-old making the roughly two-hour commute from his home in Montville, New Jersey, several times a week to cut his teeth at the national center. His mother would collect him from school and drop him at a nearby bus stop, leaving him to travel alone through Manhattan into Queens to practice on the blue courts in the shadows of Arthur Ashe and Louis Armstrong stadiums.
The years since have brought handsome returns. Zheng, whose parents emigrated from China, became the first Columbia student-athlete since 1906 to win the NCAA singles championship in 2024, then became the first man in 13 years to successfully defend the title last November.
His breakthrough on the professional tour quickly followed. Zheng began this year by qualifying for his first grand slam main draw at the Australian Open and beating Sebastian Korda over five sets in the opening round for his first tour-level victory. He followed that with another qualifying run into the French Open before reaching the third round at Wimbledon, seeing off British No 1 Cameron Norrie along the way. Somewhere in between, Zheng found time to graduate from Columbia with a degree in psychology.
“If you told me at the end of last year that I would play the main draw at all four slams, I probably wouldn’t believe whoever told me that,” he said. “I think qualifying for the first time at a slam just gives you that confidence that you can do it again.”
Wednesday marked another milestone in what’s been a remarkable rise from Ivy League tennis to the grand slam stage. The result lifted Zheng, who entered the tournament ranked 107th, to No 96 in the live rankings and into the top 100 for the first time.
“It’s kind of that benchmark, I would say, that players who want to play professionally have,” said Zheng, whose ranking sat outside the top 700 little more than a year ago. “You break the top 100, you can make a living playing tennis now. So it’s definitely really special.”
With rain having pushed his first-round match back a day, Zheng will have little time to celebrate. He returns on Thursday afternoon to face Yunchaokete Bu, the Chinese lucky loser ranked 124th, who stunned rising Spanish star Rafael Jodar 6-2, 6-1, 6-1 in one of the most lopsided scorelines of the tournament so far.
If Zheng supplied Wednesday’s homegrown surprise, Ben Shelton provided the star power. The highest-ranked American in the men’s draw survived his first serious examination of the fortnight with a 6-3, 5-7, 7-6 (3), 7-5 win over Hubert Hurkacz beneath the closed roof on Ashe.
The eighth-seeded Shelton needed nearly three hours to tame the former world No 6 in a match featuring two of the sport’s most formidable serves. After splitting the first two sets, the 23-year-old American seized control during the third-set tie-break, racing to a 3-0 lead before closing it out 7-3.
Hurkacz threatened to force a decider when he earned two break points with Shelton serving at 4-all in the fourth, but Shelton escaped and soon turned the pressure back on his opponent. With Hurkacz serving at 5-6, Shelton pounded away with his forehand until the Pole sprayed one final forehand wide.
Shelton flexed both arms and roared toward the stands after completing a victory that sent him into the round of 32 for a fourth straight year in New York.
“I was super excited to get through that one and relieved obviously, because I thought he was serving lights out, moving well, not making errors from the baseline, and it was a tall task today,” Shelton said. “I’m kind of just running my own race and focusing on the next round.”
Shelton, a semi-finalist here three years ago, arrived in New York fresh off the Montreal title and with perhaps his best chance yet at becoming the first American man to win a major singles championship since Andy Roddick at the 2003 US Open.
Another aspirant to end that 23-year wait is 11th-seeded Frances Tiafoe, who defeated Japanese qualifier Rei Sakamoto 6-3, 7-6 (2), 7-5 to reach the third round for a seventh straight year, the longest active streak among men. The 28-year-old made only 18 unforced errors to Sakamoto’s 40, while dropping serve only twice in the 2hr 40min match.
Jessica Pegula made considerably shorter work of her all-American encounter on Ashe, bundling out former Australian Open champion Sofia Kenin 6-3, 6-1 in only 56 minutes. The third seed raced away with the final seven games to progress into the third round, where she will face Canada’s Leylah Annie Fernandez.
On the Grandstand court, Alex Michelsen took out the 16th-seeded Brandon Nakashima 6-3, 6-3, 6-4 in another all-American tie, while Emma Navarro fought back from a set down to defeat Caty McNally 3-6, 6-2, 6-3. Tommy Paul fared better there in the night session, overcoming a third-set wobble to beat Croatia’s Dino Prizmic 6-2, 6-3, 5-7, 6-4 in just over three hours.
Taylor Townsend was among the day’s most emphatic American winners, trouncing Australia’s Taylah Preston 6-1, 6-1 to book a third-round date with French Open semi-finalist Diana Shnaider. Teenager Iva Jovic also went through, defeating Poland’s Magdalena Frech 7-5, 6-3, while Zachary Svajda beat Germany’s Daniel Altmaier 6-3, 6-1, 6-7 (5), 6-2.
There was disappointment for Sloane Stephens, the 2017 champion, who was beaten 6-1, 7-5 by 11th-seeded Marta Kostyuk of Ukraine. The 33-year-old offered far more resistance after being overwhelmed in the opening set, reaching set point in the second but failing to convert it and force a decider.
Also on Armstrong, Sebastian Gorzny’s debut US Open appearance came to an end against Daniil Medvedev. The 20-year-old wildcard was beaten 6-1, 6-3, 7-5 by the 2021 champion, although he pushed Medvedev throughout a competitive third set before the Russian finally broke through late.
Elsewhere on the outer courts, Marcos Giron was edged by Peru’s Ignacio Buse 3-6, 6-3, 6-3, 6-7 (6), 6-1, while Ann Li rallied to win 5-7, 7-6 (4), 6-4 over Donna Vekic.
