Aryna Sabalenka finally recovered from a poor start in the slowest start in U.S. Open history to beat 29th seed Ekaterina Alexandrova 2-6, 6-1, 6-2 at Ashe Stadium early Saturday morning to reach the fourth round.
The second seed didn't enter the match until 12:07 a.m. and lost the first set just 30 minutes later, but she took control early in the second, winning 10 straight games to take a 5-0 lead in the third.
The runner-up at Flushing Meadows last year ultimately won in one minute, 48 seconds, tying the second-slowest finishing time in a U.S. Open women's singles match and setting up a match against 33rd seed Elise Mertens on Sunday.
“I was happy that I was able to stay focused no matter what and turn this match around,” Sabalenka said.
The latest start time for a women's singles match at the U.S. Open was midnight on September 2, 1987, when Gabriela Sabatini defeated Beverly Bowes 6-3, 6-3.
The night session at Arthur Ashe Stadium got underway more than an hour later than the usual 7 p.m. start after an afternoon match that saw Francis Tiafoe beat Ben Shelton lasted four hours and three minutes.
New late-night match rules introduced this year allow tournament officials to move any matches that haven't started before 11:15 p.m. Instead, Sabalenka and Alexandrova stayed on at Ashe, where defending champion Novak Djokovic only took to the court after losing in four sets to 28th-seeded Alexei Popyrin.
A spokesman for the United States Tennis Association said tournament officials planned to keep the grandstands clear in case they wanted to reschedule the Sabalenka-Alexandrova match.
A decision was expected to be made by the end of the fourth set between Djokovic and Popyrin.
Sabalenka said she hopes to stay in the Ashe but wants to make it the opener of the evening session and take the men's lead to second place.
The bigger issue was the fast start from Alexandrova, who broke Sabalenka's serve twice in the first set.
“She was amazing, she played really well,” Sabalenka said.
But Sabalenka broke to lead 3-1 in the second set and then quickly improved, finishing the match before Maria Sakkari's women's singles final finish against Bianca Andreescu at 2:13 a.m. on September 6, 2021.
Sabalenka was in bed by 4 a.m., hoping to sleep as long as possible.
“Technically, we practiced today, so we're good to go tomorrow, right?” she joked. “Can I tell my team that? It's 2 a.m. We'll do the same number as we did today.”
It wasn't the last match: Fourth seed Alexander Zverev beat Thomas Martin Echeverry 5-7, 7-5, 6-1, 6-3 in the match that ended at 2:35 a.m.
