As the US Open continued on Friday, Ben Shelton and Frances Tiafoe faced off in a highly anticipated third-round matchup. The well-matched, All-American contest ended with Tiafoe victorious 4-6, 7-5, 6-7 (5), 6-4, 6-3 after five thrilling sets.
Tiafoe will advance to his fifth straight Round of 16 at Flushing Meadows, where he’ll face the winner of Friday night’s Novak Djokovic vs. Alexei Popyrin match. Tiafoe is the first American man to post such a streak since Andre Agassi back in 2005.
He and Shelton were well-matched from the start, with Shelton, who broke through with a win over Tiafoe last year, taking the first set with a 6-4 win. In the second, Shelton took an early lead, but Tiafoe came from down 5-4 to win the set 7-5.
The third set was incredibly even, with the players trading breaks on their way to a tiebreaker, while playing some high-level tennis.
The tiebreak was more dramatic, as they often are. Shelton jumped out to a 6-0 lead, but Tiafoe responded by holding off five straight set points, largely off of Shelton’s mistakes. He finished one set point short, as Shelton hit an ace with a 143 mph serve to close out the set and take a 2-1 match lead.
Tiafoe took the early lead in the fourth set, going up 3-2, but Shelton won the next game and brought things back to 3-3. The two traded a game each, before Tiafoe took a game uncontested to lead 5-4. In the deciding game, Tiafoe took advantage of a few key Shelton errors to win the set 6-4.
Tiafoe broke Shelton early in the fifth set, and the younger player simply looked too gassed to mount another comeback. A number of high-effort service sets caught up with him, while Tiafoe looked bouncy as ever.
Both Americans played well to their strengths, with Shelton serving up his usual showmanship while Tiafoe had some excellent, well-placed shots down the line. Tiafoe also took advantage of Shelton’s mistakes, as the 21-year-old Shelton finished the match with 58 unforced errors to Tiafoe’s 27.
Shelton’s strength was instead in his serve, with 23 aces and plenty more winners off Tiafoe’s returns.
Shelton vs. Tiafoe has turned into something of a rivalry in the past year. Friday’s game was a rematch of last year’s US Open, when a then-20-year-old Shelton defeated Tiafoe in four sets to advance to the semifinals and celebrated by pretending to hang up the phone. Shelton went on to lose to Novak Djokovic in the semifinals. Notably, Tiafoe will face Djokovic in the next round if Djokovic defeats Popyrin.
Friday’s matchups were good to the Americans, starting with Coco Gauff defeating Elina Svitolina in three after dropping the first set. Gauff will now face fellow American Emma Navarro in the fourth round this weekend.