Carlos Alcaraz stunned by Botic van de Zandschulp at US Open

August 29, 2024, 11:50 PM ET

After double-faulting and falling two sets to none behind — a deficit he never overcame — in the second round of the U.S. Open on Thursday night, Carlos Alcaraz slung his equipment bag over one shoulder and trudged toward the locker room.

Glancing toward his coach, 2003 French Open champion Juan Carlos Ferrero, Alcaraz pointed his right index finger at his temple and then wiggled the finger, as if to say, “I'm not thinking clearly.”

He could have been excused for being disoriented by what was happening under the closed retractable roof of Arthur Ashe Stadium on a freezing evening. A set later, Alcaraz's 15-match unbeaten run in Grand Slams ended with a 6-1, 7-5, 6-4 defeat to Botic van de Zandschulp, ranked 74th in the world.

“It was a fight against myself, in my head, during the match,” Alcaraz said. “In tennis, you play against someone who wants the same thing as you, to win the match, and you have to be as calm as possible, just to think better during the match and try to do good things. Today I was playing against my opponent, and I was playing against myself, in my head. There were a lot of emotions that I couldn't control.”

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The result eliminated the men's pre-tournament favorite and was certainly difficult to predict in advance, given Alcaraz's position as the No. 3 seed, his recent excellence and his opponent's much lesser resume.

The loss follows another defeat at Ashe for former US Open champion Naomi Osaka, who was eliminated Thursday by Karolina Muchova 6-3, 7-6 (5). That loss, however, is nothing like Alcaraz's.

He won the French Open in June and Wimbledon in July, bringing his career total to four major championships, including the 2022 Flushing Meadows title. In early August, Alcaraz won a silver medal at the Paris Olympics, losing to Novak Djokovic in the final.

Perhaps, Alcaraz acknowledged, a tennis schedule he described as “so tight” left him too exhausted.

“I probably came here with less energy than I thought. [have]”, he said. “But I mean, I don't want to use that as an excuse.”

Carlos Alcaraz, the pre-tournament betting favorite after winning the French Open in June and Wimbledon in July, had never lost before the quarter-finals in his three previous US Open appearances. Luke Hales/Getty Images

What is certain is that he never found his marks against Van de Zandschulp, a 28-year-old Dutchman. Alcaraz was off his game, repeatedly missing the shots he usually makes.

The 21-year-old Spaniard came into the US Open with a 16-2 record, having never lost before the quarterfinals in his three previous appearances. It was also Alcaraz's first loss at a major since he was eliminated in the second round of Wimbledon in 2021 as a teenager; he has never been beaten in the first round of a Grand Slam tournament.

In contrast, Van de Zandschulp has only reached a Grand Slam quarter-final once, at the US Open in 2021.

Otherwise, he’s not someone most people would have expected to pull off this kind of monumental upset. Consider this: Van de Zandschulp was 11-18 on the season entering this week and hadn’t won back-to-back matches at a Tour-level event in 2024 until now.

“I’m actually a little bit lost for words,” he said. “It’s been an incredible night for me.”

It was sure that it was.

The key statistic is that Van de Zandschulp won the point on 28 of his 35 net passes.

The first set was incredibly unbalanced. With Van de Zandschulp's powerful forehands and serves reaching 212 km/h, Alcaraz never seemed to feel comfortable.

He failed to score a single winner in that set and was nearly beaten 24-13 overall. The second set was a little better for him, but not enough, and a double fault gave Van de Zandschulp a break of serve that gave him a 6-5 lead. When Alcaraz pushed a forehand wide to end the next game, Van de Zandschulp completed a hold at zero that gave him the first two sets after an hour of play.

It didn't take long for Alcaraz to find himself 3-2 down by a break in the third round, but he immediately fought back, helped by Van de Zandschulp's double fault that gave him the break and made it 3-3. Alcaraz then held firm and smiled as he strutted towards the change of ends.

But that smile soon disappeared as Alcaraz's mistakes kept coming and Van de Zandschulp never gave up.

“Of course I was a little bit nervous, but I think if you want to beat one of these guys you have to keep calm and keep a cool head,” said Van de Zandschulp, who will face 25th seed Jack Draper of Britain in the third round on Saturday. “Otherwise they take advantage.”

Alcaraz is the first top-three player to lose in the first two rounds of the US Open since 2006, when No. 3 seed Ivan Ljubicic lost in the first round to Feliciano López. It is the earliest second-round loss by a pre-tournament betting favorite in the men's US Open since Patrick Rafter in 1999, who was the defending champion but retired from his first-round match against Cédric Pioline with a shoulder injury.

Alcaraz entered the night with a 25-1 record in major tournaments against players ranked outside the top 50, with the lone loss coming against No. 95 Mikael Ymer in the second round of the 2021 Australian Open.

The Associated Press and ESPN Stats & Information contributed to this report.

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