NEW YORK—When Bethanie Mattek-Sands, eyes blackened like a regular Aaron Rodgers and anchored in bright red high-top sneakers, came back from a 40-0 deficit to break Venus Williams in the very first game of their first-round U.S. Open match today in Arthur Ashe stadium, it kindled hope in those who have taken a shine to the iconoclastic, tattooed, fun-loving underdog.
Alas, that faith was short-lived. Williams, as elegant in her vibrant floral print dress as Mattek-Sands was funky in her white knee socks and Andrew Charles white tank-top (“It’s more rock and roll than tennis,” Bethanie would tell me later. “Steven Tyler of Aerosmith is promoting it.”), belted her way back into—and beyond—contention.
Still up a break at 2-1, Mattek-Sands won the first point in the next game, then lost four straight points to be broken in four straight points. Before long, Venus had won 17 of 18 points and built a 5-2 lead that would not be seriously challenged (Venus won the match, 6-3, 6-1).
Ordinarily, a match like this at the U.S. Open would not bear much discussion, but I was struck by the fact that this one was a battle of the outsiders—two women who show that even the elitist roots of tennis have never been enough to keep a good woman (or man) down. For the record, tennis has never, ever been dominated by pampered players who grew up in the lap of the country club, but we’ll leave that larger discussion for another time.
By now, we know chapter and verse of the Venus and Serena Williams narrative; their unique status as sisters operating at a comparably—and insanely—high level demanded that we study and promote it. But the road Mattek-Sands traveled in tennis has some striking similarities, and the main difference between these players, apart from the incidental difference in skin color, is that Venus has been much more successful.
So successful, that it’s always tempting to look upon a player like Mattek-Sands as cannon fodder for a champion, ignoring just how fundamentally gifted she is in ways that most people with a passion for sports can only dream about.
Mattek-Sands’ father was a semi-pro basketball player who had no real experience in tennis, but started playing with Bethanie so they could spend time together. As a shy child, she looked to sports as a way to make friends and find some commonality with other kids. She was, in her own words, “a superior little athlete, if that doesn’t sound too much like bragging.”
At a multi-school track meet, her childhood friends still remind her, she walked away with five of the coveted blue ribbons and one (second-place) red. The following year at the same event, she ran the table—leaving the grounds with all blue. “I remember getting off the bus after the meet with all these ribbons,” Bethanie told me. “And my parents, their jaws just about dropped.”
Playing on a soccer team for eight-year olds, she watched a teammate miss a kick and ran to her father, puzzled, and asked: “How do you completely miss a soccer ball when it’s just sitting there?”
Just as her competitive tennis career was heating up, Mattek-Sands moved from Minnesota to a town near Appleton, Wisconsin. It was going from the frying pan into the fire, and not in a good way. By then Mattek-Sands had decided to focus on tennis because she was so good at it, so soon. She quickly began to outgrow the competition available in the USTA Midwest Section, even though she frequently entered the 18-and-under events.
Shortly after Bethanie turned 12, her family decided to move to Florida to advance her tennis career—heading south in much the same way the Williamses headed east from California just a few years earlier.
“At some point there, dad did push me,” she said. “You know, wake up and go practice tennis before school. Weekends the family would hop in the van and we’d all go off to some junior event.”
In Florida, Mattek-Sands cobbled together some partial scholarships and family funding to work out deals at the Chris Evert Tennis Academy (now a USTA developmental center) as well as Rick Macci’s academy—where the Williams sisters also spent some time.
When Mattek-Sands was 14, she went to France to try to qualify for the world junior championships, Les Petits. While she was there, her father called the USTA and told them that when Bethanie returned from Paris, she would have to quit tennis. The family just didn’t have any money left to support her development, and what support they were given by sponsors was insufficient.
That week, Mattek-Sands qualified for the main draw, and went on to win both singles and doubles. The memory still brings a smile to her pleasant, expressive face. In retrospect, it was perhaps her own well-disguised and most critical career highlight. “First round, I was down, 5-1 in the third to a high seed. I was also behind in the final. It was crazy, but when I won it, the USTA decided to help us out.”
