Cheers to Second Place!

So here's the thing about this weekend's championship matches in Canada -- once the final fields were settled, you pretty much knew what was going to happen. World #1 Serena Williams walked away with her eighth title of the year in Toronto, dropping just two games on Sunday, while Rafael Nadal, coming off an important win over top-seeded Novak Djokovic in the Montreal semis, was the heavy favorite in the final and won his twenty-fifth Masters title with little drama.

But the real story of this weekend might be that of the also-rans, the two runners-up who made their way to their first Tier One tournament finals by racking up a series of impressive wins during the week. They might not have come away with the wins this time, but the level of play they brought to their games might mean they've got what it takes to make a bigger impact down the road. And maybe this time the silver medalists won't dwell on the fact they came up short and can revel in the great things they did accomplish.

Sorana Cirstea had worked her way into the top thirty four years ago after a Cinderella run at the 2009 French Open. But she struggled even at the end of that year, losing five straight first round matches to finish off the season, and by the start of 2011 was back in triple digits. But the young Romanian slogged it out on the ITF circuit, got her game back on track last year and finished 2012 at #27 in the world. She'd pulled off a couple big wins this season, including a defeat of then-#6 Angelique Kerber in Miami, but really hit her stride in Canada. Unseeded at the Rogers Cup she took out two former #1's -- Caroline Wozniacki and Jelena Jankovic -- before ousting a couple Grand Slam champions. It was Cirstea's first championship match since winning a title in Tashkent back in 2008, and only her third career final. She might not have made a big dent against Serena in the barely one-hour match, but by leaving the trail of corpses on her way to the final not only got her to her highest-ever ranking this week, but may have proven she's got the talent to at least hit with the big girls.

Over in Montreal the men faced a similarly deep field with eight top ten players making the trip to the Great White North. Things were shaky, though, with two-time champion Andy Murray losing his third round match to Ernests Gulbis and third-seeded David Ferrer dropping in straights to world #83 Alex Bogomolov. Still Milos Raonic's advance to his first Masters final was nothing to scoff at -- he stunned Washington champion Juan Martin Del Potro in the third round and won the battle of Canadians in the semis after losing the middle set to Vasek Pospisil. Though he already has four titles to his name, three of which came in San Jose, this would've by far been his biggest and, having been unable to follow up on his first deep Major run, could have reminded the sport's elite of his relevance. Raonic couldn't capitalize this time, though, with the big server broken four out of four times. Still, it was a breakthrough to make it this far, and if he is able to learn from the experience, he might just be able to make an impact in New York.

Both of this weekend's champions re-cemented themselves at the top of the game, but the runners-up too were able to break new ground with their wins all week. It's not always about bringing home the biggest trophy, after all, and hopefully these almost-champions can use what they've learned and parlay it into an even brighter future.

Put Up, or Shut Up

The first few weeks of the summer hard court season can be tricky to navigate -- while some of the sport's top players skip the smaller tournaments, plenty others slug it out week after week at events where relatively few points are on the line. But with bigger bounties at stake this week in Canada, this past weekend's champions will want to prove they can deliver when it really counts.

The heat took a bit of a toll on the ladies in Washington, with the favorites at the Citi Open falling earlier than expected. But that opened the door for a couple others to strut their stuff, hopefully putting themselves back on the map as they head to New York. Andrea Petkovic, a year removed from her career-high in the top ten, has been working her way back up the rankings since injuries cut her 2012 season short. She wasn't seeded in Washington, but nevertheless caused upsets of both Mona Barthel and Alize Cornet on the way to her second final of the year. But she was ultimately stopped by defending champion Magdalena Rybarikova, who's currently playing some of the best tennis of her career. The petite Slovak, who beat both Ekaterina Makarova and top-seeded Angelique Kerber in DC, kept her momentum going early this week in Toronto with a straight-set win earlier today. It's a better result than some other champions have seen of late -- Dominika Cibulkova lost her very next match after winning a title in Stanford -- so hopefully Rybarikova can keep it up. She's never made much of a splash at any Premier event, so this could be her chance.

The stakes were a little higher for the men in DC, with the first nine seeds all ranked in the top twenty-five. There was some follow-through here, with Atlanta runner-up Kevin Anderson getting back to the quarters and John Isner, the champion down South, making his way all the way back to the final, albeit being the favorite in each of his first four matches. He even seemed to have the upper hand in Sunday's final, opening by taking his only set off 2009 U.S. Open champion Juan Martin Del Potro in their previous meetings. But the top seed, coming off a late-night semifinal win over Tommy Haas, was able to regroup, dominating his fellow big man and winning his third straight title in the U.S. capital. DelPo gets a first round bye at the Rogers Cup this week, but he's certainly parlayed success here into bigger things in the past. Isner, meanwhile, may need to do some serious soul-searching -- though he certainly has a big weapon, he continues to struggle closing out matches -- he was forced to three sets and two tiebreaks in his Montreal opener, eventually losing to wildcard Vasek Pospisil in over two and a half hours. If he can't capitalize better on what he's got, it's hard to see him making any kind of dent when it counts.

The ladies who battled it out in Carlsbad last week have been a little more battle-tested. Finalists Victoria Azarenka and Sam Stosur have won three Grand Slam titles between them, though neither has been at the top of her game recently -- Vika, injured during her first round at Wimbledon, has been recovering in the weeks since while the Australian was a disappointing 19-15 on the year before heading to California. But both ladies pulled themselves together at the Southern Cali Open and, though both were tested -- Azarenka by Ana Ivanovic in the semifinal and Stosur by Aga Radwanska in the quarters -- proved they were back. And Stosur kept her run going, ending an eight-match losing streak to the former world-#1 and winning her first title in almost two years. Azarenka subsequently pulled out of this week's Rogers Cup in Toronto, while Stosur will open against qualifier Julia Glushko later today. The win should come easy for the newly anointed world-#11, but a good performance could mean big results for her in New York again. And having lost a bit of her luster over the past eighteen months, there may never be a better time for just that.

This is the time of summer where things get serious, and last week's champions will have to get right back to work. If they're going to make a real statement on their way to the Open, they don't get a chance to let their performance drop even a little. But if they can show us what they're really capable of, the payoff is sure to be worth it.

Off to Summer Camp

The temperatures may have been soaring for a while now, at least here in the northeastern U.S., but the sport's top stars have only just begun to make their way across the Atlantic and onto the American hardcourts. But there is no time to simply camp out under the stars -- the early arrivals were put to the test during the first events of the U.S. Open Series, and this weekend's winners may have given themselves quite a head-start in the big race to New York.

At the Bank of the West Classic in Stanford we saw the old guard clash with new. But while veterans like Francesca Schiavone and Sam Stosur struggled to get out of the early rounds, rising stars such as Jamie Hampton and on-the-mend Sorana Cirstea worked their way through to the semis. But at the end of the day it was top-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska and often spotty Dominika Cibulkova contesting the final, a rematch of the Sydney championship in which the Pole didn't drop a game.

But the results would be surprisingly different this time around. Though Cibulkova has scored some big wins in the past -- she beat then-world #1 Victoria Azarenka at last year's French Open and Caroline Wozniacki, also the top seed at the time, the year before at Wimbledon -- she's also squandered huge opportunities, most recently at Miami this past March when she had a set and a break up on Serena Williams. The Slovak was also 4-0 against Radwanska before coming to California, only taking a set from the favorite in their previous meetings. She was down in this match too, dropping the first set to the 2012 runner-up at the All England Club. It looked like Aga had regrouped, though, when she took a 4-2 lead in the decider, but the petite Cibulkova somehow found a way to rally, winning the last four games of the match and, in the process, claiming her third career title in as many years. And after bringing a middling 17-16 record on the season to Stanford, there may never have been a better opportunity to turn things around.

On the other side of the country the men hit the pavement in Atlanta, with a couple players looking for redemption. Two-time champion Mardy Fish, having missed most of the season with heart troubles, made only his second Tour appearance of the year, and Ryan Harrison, a disappointing 5-16 on the year before the BB&T Open, made a solid run to the semis, pushing his ranking back up to near double-digits. But here too the favorites prevailed. Top-seeded John Isner avenged a loss in Newport to Lleyton Hewitt to make his third final in Georgia, while fellow big-server Kevin Anderson rallied after a tough opening match to make his third championship round of the year.

And this title match wasn't straightforward either. The two men -- a combined thirteen feet and four inches tall -- served up forty-five aces between them, but neither were ever able to break serve. Anderson, who actually had eleven chances to win a return game, took the first set in a tiebreak, but failed to convert match points in the second. Isner, meanwhile, seemed to get a second wind one he was able to force a decider, and after nearly three hours finally pulled out the win to claim his second crown of the season -- and to keep his record in finals this season perfect.

Both these champions got off to a great start this weekend, and atop their respective leader-boards, they've put themselves deep in the heat to claim the U.S. Open Series honor. But plenty of elite will be arriving at camp over the next few weeks and the competition is certainly going to get hotter. Whether they're able to take home the prize at the end of the season remains in question, but if they can capitalize on their early leads, they might just give us something big to watch the rest of the summer.

Even More Upsetting

There seems to be a strange new trend in tennis these days, where players, even the most favored ones, prove they're fallible time and again. We saw it happen throughout the fortnight at Wimbledon, and the phenomenon resumed posthaste once the trophies were presented.

Here's the thing, though: it's not enough to simply poke a hole or two in the draw -- you've got to follow through after that. That was less the case at the All England Club, with the vanquishers of both Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal both losing one round later. Things weren't much better on the ladies' side -- while Sabine Lisicki rode her upset of Serena Williams all the way to the final, Michelle Larcher de Brito couldn't do much more after defeating Maria Sharapova in the second round.

That same trend has also manifested itself in the current tournaments. Daniel Brands, having scored a huge upset over Federer in his Gstaad opener, subsequently lost to Victor Hanescu a day later, while Albert Montanes ousted top Umag seed Richard Gasquet and then lost a long battle Friday to Gael Monfils. And Ons Jabeur, who ousted defending Baku champion Bojana Jovanovski on Wednesday, suffered an ankle injury during her match today, allowing qualifier Magda Linette -- ranked #226 in the world -- into her first ever Tour semi. But hope is not lost for everyone, and a couple players still have a shot at proving their early successes this week were no fluke.

Nineteen year old Elina Svitolina won her first Tour title last year in Pune, beating Andrea Petkovic in the process, and in 2013 she's made the semis in both Cali and Bad Gastein. This week she took to the hard courts of Baku as the seventh seed and earlier today took out Birmingham finalist Donna Vekic in a quick two sets. In the semis she'll face Alexandra Cadantu, the only other seed left in the draw -- the Ukraine native lost the pair's only previous meeting, but that was some two years ago when she was ranked outside the top four hundred. A win on Saturday -- and, dare we speculate, maybe on Sunday too -- would not only underscore her performance so far, but might just push her into the higher tiers of the sport.

Meanwhile in Gstaad, Robin Haase is trying to make a similar move up the rankings. The Dutchman, who returns to Kitzbuhel next week to defend the title he's won the past two years, has yet to manage a sustained stay in the top forty. But after dominating third-seeded Janko Tipsarevic in Switzerland, the twenty-six year old survived a two-and-a-half hour battle against Marcel Granollers to make the semis. With world #29 Feliciano Lopez the highest seed remaining, the field is wide open for Haase to add a new trophy to his case and maybe give him the oomph he needs to really establish himself in the sport.

Of course upsets have been known to bring tears to the eye, but while both these players have caused their opponents woe this week, they'll want to make sure their own cheeks stay dry throughout the summer. It'll be a hard task, to be sure, but after the performances they've already put up there's no reason think it's impossible.

And with the way things are going this summer, there may be no better time to get stuff done.

Deep Seeded Anxiety

After the rampant bracket busting we saw at Wimbledon this year, we can't really be surprised by the upsets that have come in the weeks that followed. In fact, only one favorite won a title this past weekend, while everyone else broke new ground on their way to the winners' circles. Their performances show just how deep the talent in the fields has become, and may make even the biggest stars a little nervous.

The only top seed to survive the week's action was, maybe not surprisingly, Serena Williams. Playing for the first time in Bastad, Sweden, the world #1 was able to redeem herself after a shockingly early exit at the All England Club -- though she didn't face a player in the top thirty, she did make her way to this title without dropping a set, defeating 2011 runner-up Johanna Larsson in under eighty minutes during Sunday's final. It was Williams' fifty-third career title, her seventh of the year, and should do a lot to erase the memory of a disappointing run in London as she preps for the hardcourt season. But we've seen so often this year that nothing is certain on these courts -- and all the other winners this weekend prove that not all top seeds are safe.

That was quite apparent in Bad Gastein, where world #33 Mona Barthel retired while down a set to Austrian wildcard Lisa-Marie Moser, and up-and-coming German teenager Annika Beck won just a game in her quarterfinal match. Karin Knapp, something of a Cinderella at Wimbledon a few weeks back, was the only seed to make the semis, and even she couldn't cut it against eventual champion Yvonne Meusburger. The twenty-nine year old veteran reached her second straight final, having lost last weekend to Simona Halep in Budapest. But this time against doubles specialist Andrea Hlavackova, playing in her first ever singles championship, the hometown girl had the advantage. After surviving a tight first set, Meusburger won her first career trophy, reached her highest career ranking and proved some things do get better with age.

That sentiment is also true for Ivo Karlovic, who'd been struggling to come back from injury almost a year before being struck by illness in April. The big-serving Croat came to Bogota ranked out of the top hundred-fifty and title-less for over five years, and at thirty-four seemed unlikely to change that. But he withstood some tough challenges in Colombia -- he played five tiebreaks on his way to the final, only dropping one set to second seed Kevin Anderson in the semis. Meanwhile twenty-nine year old Alejandro Falla, himself ranked in triple digits and coming off a win over world #14 Janko Tipsarevic in the quarters, was playing his first ever title match. But Karlovic proved too much for the relatively untested local -- in a quick two-set match which brought his ace total above a hundred for the tournament, nearly three hundred for the year, Dr. Ivo landed his first crown in half a decade and put him back on the radar for the rest of the field.

On the radar too, now, are the two finalists in Hamburg, each of whom pulled off some of the biggest wins of their careers to make the title match. Young Federico Delbonis had won a handful of Challenger events before heading to Germany, but had only spent a total of one week inside the top hundred -- he hit #98 in the world after winning in Barranquilla. But he began his campaign last week with a win over Tommy Robredo and followed up by defeating recently resurgent Fernando Verdasco in the quarters. His biggest triumph, though, was over a much bigger fish -- in the semis he took on four-time champ Roger Federer and, against all odds at the bet-at-home Open, came out the winner. Meanwhile Fabio Fognini, long an also-ran in this sport, took out hometown hero Tommy Haas before ousting clay court specialist Nicolas Almagro to make his second final of the year. And ultimately the Italian's experience won out -- after dropping the first set and saving three match points in a tiebreak, the twenty-six year wrapped up the tightest final of the weekend, extending his win streak to ten matches and two titles since Wimbledon. Suddenly a top-twenty player, he's proven that even underdogs have a little bite to them.

Whether this weekend's results show that the favorites have lost a bit of their sparkle or that the longshots have upped the ante remains to be seen. Certainly a loss this week doesn't mean a career is over -- nor that momentum will last in the months that come. But with even the most unheard-of players proving they can hit with the big guys, it sure will be fun watching them all fight it out.

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Failure to Launch?

Wimbledon is over, people!

It's been over a month since we crowned this year's French Open king and queen!

This is the time in the season when players should be making the switch to hard courts as they prep for the last Major of the year. But for a reason I've never understood, none of the events this week help athletes transition, keeping some still on the grass and sending many more all the way back to the clay. Sure, the surfaces may play to some stars' strengths better than the American concrete, but can they keep it up once they're in full U.S. Open tune-up mode?

The top seeds have struggled so far in Budapest with Lucie Safarova winning just one game in her opener against world #190 Valeria Solovyeva and 2008 champion Alize Cornet faring little better. Of course, they could turn things around once they hit the pavement -- Safarova, after all, made a nice run to the Montreal semis last year -- but others might be poised to make a bigger statement. Simona Halep went on a ten-match winning streak just before Wimbledon, winning two titles on two surfaces. She didn't fare so well at the all England Club, but this time she could resume her momentum and get in some rest before heading to New York. She's won her first two matches in Hungary with little drama and, as the top seed remaining, could give herself a nice bolt of confidence before switching to hard courts the next few weeks.

Meanwhile in Palermo one clay court specialist is looking to erase her own memory of a bad Wimbledon. Two-time champion Sara Errani has been a little quieter on the dirt this year than last, but she did well at the premier events early in the season and made her way back to the Roland Garros semis. In 2012 she parlayed a win in her homeland into a semi showing in New York and, though certainly not a sure thing, her performance her would make up for a first round exit from the All England Club. But also watch out for Germany's Dinah Pfizenmaier -- though she's spent most of the year on the ITF circuit, a run to the French Open third round put her on the radar. She's already upset eighth seeded Karolina Pliskova and veteran Anabel Medina Garrigues in Italy, but has yet to make many strides off the surface. If she can take the lessons she's learned the last few weeks with her, it could bode well for her summer season.

It's not just the women who've used this week to go back in time. Nicolas Almagro, last year's runner-up in Bastad, came back from an ugly first set to beat Guillermo Garcia-Lopez earlier today while recent top-ten player Juan Monaco, a disappointing 16-14 on the year so far, earned himself a quarterfinal match against Grigor Dimitrov. But the best story in this draw might be Fernando Verdasco, whose quarterfinal run at the All England Club put him squarely back on the tennis map. And on clay, arguably his best surface, he might be able to accomplish even more -- he hasn't really been tested in his first two matches but could give Almagro a challenge next. More good results in Sweden might be what he needs to show recent success was no fluke and to ride his wave to bigger wins in the U.S.

A couple men in Stuttgart, on the other hand, are looking to get momentum back on their side. Gael Monfils seemed to be well on the comeback trail with a title in Bordeaux and a runner-up finish in Nice, but pulled out of Wimbledon a few days before the tournament began. He'd climbed back well in the first half of the year, cutting his ranking from triple digits in February to #60 in the world now, but is still out of seeding territory in Germany. He did pull off wins over always tricky Paul-Henri Mathieu and sixth seeded Florian Mayer, though, and might have laid the groundwork for success the next part of the season. But he'll have to get past Philipp Kohlschreiber first -- the second-ranked German took a bit of a tumble when his first round exit at the All England Club fell far short of his quarterfinal run last year, but he could turn things around now. He'll need to, too, since he's got a bunch of hard court points to defend too -- including a fourth-round at the Open -- so his third round against Monfils might carry more importance than usual.

While all these guys and gals took this week to revert to spring-time play, the men in Newport chose to stick to the grass, and not all got the desired results -- top seeded Sam Querrey, a finalist here in 2009, notched his second straight opening round loss, this time to world #120 Tim Smyczek. But defending champion John Isner might be able to take advantage of the hole his compatriot left in the draw -- the big-serving American retired from his second round at Wimbledon, but has been on point so far at the Hall of Fame. This is often his best time of year -- he's won titles at Newport and Winston-Salem the last two years running -- but once did it mean a solid run in New York. After fits and starts in 2013, he'll want to make sure this time counts. And his arch-nemesis and very good friend Nicolas Mahut is lurking in the top half of the draw, fresh(-ish) off his first career title in Den Bosch. He's never had much luck off the grass, but if he does meet and beat Isner in this final, he might be turning his entire career around.

This week's tournaments, admittedly, didn't give players much choice but to put off their hard court seasons just a little bit, but hopefully their experiences this week will serve as a good launching pad for the summer events. With the U.S. Open just over a month away, the competition is only going to heat up from here, and they'll need to keep the momentum they've garnered this week without wearing themselves out.

After all, at this stage in the year, the last thing they want is to find themselves stuck at an age they won't be able to grow out of.