Ben Shelton Advances in US Open Amid Rain and Chaos
Ben Shelton has made Flushing Meadows his playground again.
The American No. 8 seed punched his ticket to the US Open third round on Wednesday, outlasting Hubert Hurkacz 6-3, 5-7, 7-6 (3), 7-5 in a bruising, rain-soaked day that turned the grounds into a stop-start survival test.
Shelton, who needed four sets in his opener as well, is quietly building a serious hard-court Slam résumé. He has now reached the third round at eight straight majors on this surface, and he knows his way around this particular stage: he broke through here last year with a run to the semifinals.
This time, he had to grind.
Shelton flew out of the blocks, taking the first set 6-3 with the kind of first-strike tennis that has turned him into one of the most dangerous young players on tour. Hurkacz, though, refused to be a prop in the Shelton show. The Pole raised his level, tightened his serve, and clawed back the second set 7-5 to drag the match into a street fight.
The pressure finally told in the third-set tiebreak. Shelton, who had been flirting with danger on his service games, suddenly locked in. He took the breaker 7-3, then rode that surge into the fourth, where he broke late and closed out the match 7-5.
Afterward, he leaned into the value of this kind of early-round test.
“I think being battle-tested is great,” Shelton said, reflecting on another four-set slog. He admitted he “maybe” could have finished the job more cleanly, but he pointed straight at Hurkacz’s rising level as the reason it stretched. Being pushed, he added, forced out improvements he’d been trying to make over the past few days. “Playing a match like that definitely, you know, benefits me moving forward.”
On a day when the weather wouldn’t cooperate, that mindset mattered.
Rain, roofs and a restless schedule
For the second straight day, rain swept over New York and scrambled the schedule. Outside courts went quiet again, with play stopping and starting, while the roofs over Arthur Ashe Stadium and Louis Armstrong Stadium turned those arenas into the day’s main stages.
Under the cover of Ashe, No. 7 seed Daniil Medvedev barely broke stride.
He dismissed Sebastian Gorzny 6-3, 6-3, 7-5, the only real pause coming from a bizarre interruption when two birds decided to perch on the net mid-point. Medvedev expected the chair umpire to halt play. He didn’t. The point continued, Medvedev ripped a winner, and only then did the call come to replay it.
“This would be definitely in the top five,” he said when asked where the moment ranked among his odd episodes at Flushing Meadows. He shrugged off the confusion. “It’s okay. It happens.”
The chaos wasn’t limited to what landed on the net. With Tuesday’s downpours backing up the order of play, the tournament scrambled to squeeze in 25 men’s singles matches on Wednesday alone. When the US Open shifted to a Sunday start last year, the idea was simple: spread the first round over three days and have everyone safely into round two by Wednesday.
The rain tore that plan up. Some players were only just getting their campaigns underway.
De Minaur adapts, Jodar routed
Alex de Minaur, the No. 6 seed, saw his schedule tossed around like a spare towel. His match got moved twice from its original court before he finally walked out onto Court 11 to start his US Open.
Once he did, he wasted no time.
The Australian dismantled Italy’s Andrea Guerrieri 6-2, 6-2, 6-4, handling the stop-start buildup with the composure of a man who has accepted that chaos is part of the job.
“It’s been a couple tough days,” de Minaur said. “But I mean, these tournaments, it’s all about adapting and that’s the name of the game. There’s too much to play for to let something like this affect you.”
On another court, 19-year-old No. 12 seed Rafael Jodar discovered just how unforgiving this event can be when rhythm disappears.
The Spaniard, who arrived in New York on the back of a strong summer, was taken apart by China’s Yunchaokete Bu, losing 6-2, 6-1, 6-1 as their rain-staggered first-round match finally crawled to a conclusion.
“I knew it wasn’t going to be easy because I was waiting a lot yesterday and today as well, but it is what it is,” Jodar said. “We cannot control the rain, so it’s difficult for both players.”
Difficult, but Bu handled it far better.
An upset in the all-American clash
As the night session wore on and the first round at last drew to a close, one result jumped out from the pile.
American Alex Michelsen delivered a clean, composed upset, knocking out fellow countryman and No. 16 seed Brandon Nakashima 6-3, 6-4, 6-4. No drama, no five-set tension. Just a straight-sets statement on a day when so many players were fighting the skies as much as their opponents.
By the time the lights dimmed, the tournament had finally caught up with itself. The first round was in the books, the second round fully in motion, and the draw beginning to take shape.
Shelton is still swinging. Medvedev is gliding. De Minaur has shown he can ride out the turbulence.
The rain will eventually stop. The questions their tennis is asking of this US Open will not.
