Dominik Koepfer has new awareness after breakthrough at US Open

Prior to his fourth round appointment at the US Open three weeks ago against Daniil Medvedev, only avid tennis fans were aware of Dominik Koepfer. After taking the opening set and leading 2-0 in the second, Koepfer was beaten on Louis Armstrong Stadium by the Russian in four sets. Medvedev, of course, moved on to his first major final, and he was a central figure at the Open after surging dynamically through summer. But a lot of spectators serendipitously discovered Koepfer that late afternoon and early evening in New York, and the prevailing view was that he will be a player well worth watching in the future.

Koepfer hails from Germany, stands 5’11”, weighs 175 pounds, plays left-handed, turned pro in 2016, and currently is at a career-high of No. 85 in the world. He was a two-time All-American at Tulane University during his four productive years of college tennis from 2012-2016, and achieved the highly coveted No. 1 ranking during his senior year on the collegiate battlefield.

I spoke with Koepfer on the telephone last week, and the 25-year-old said, “I felt I had the game over the last few years, but ever since I finished college I was struggling to be consistent and not freak out when I am down. During an entire tournament I could never get two or three matches in a row where I played well. But over the last couple of months I have started to figure some things out.”

Koepfer’s remarkable run to the round of 16 at the US Open as a qualifier did not happen by accident. He has worked inordinately hard. At the end of his abbreviated rookie season as a professional in 2016, he stood at No. 579 in the ATP Rankings. A year later, he climbed to No. 284. By the end of 2018, Koepfer had moved up to No. 156.

Recalling the early stages of his pro career, Koepfer says, “My goal was to be in the Top 100 at some point but I didn’t know if that was going to be possible or not. I didn’t have any ranking points coming out of college so I had to play qualies for $15,000 and $25,000 Futures tournaments. Being a foreign player who had played college tennis you don’t get any wildcards. That wasn’t easy. After like a year, I was finally straight into main draws of Futures. I had to do the same thing with Challengers and grind through qualies.”

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How did he not lose confidence? Koepfer replies, “I was struggling in the beginning when I first started playing Futures tournaments, but then I got over it. I told myself there was no way I was going to make it if I kept getting stuck with the same draws over and over again. You have to move on. There is no way one match should affect the next three weeks, but at the beginning on the pro tour that was happening to me. In college it is completely different. About 80% or 90% of the time, I knew I was going to win. But in the pros there are so many good players that you have to accept that you are going to lose every week except for maybe twice a year when you win a tournament.”

Gradually, Koepfer got his bearings. In 2018, he was a finalist in a San Francisco Challenger event early in the year and then made it to the semifinals at a Houston Challenger late in the season. This year, he took some hard setbacks during the first six months, coming out on the losing end in 12 of his first 17 matches despite some honorable efforts. But then he nearly beat Dan Evans on the grass in Nottingham. He captured a Challenger event for the first time in Ilkley, taking a final set tie-break in the title-round contest against Dennis Novak in Great Britain. And he won a match in the main draw of a major for the first time at Wimbledon, upending world No. 52 Filip Krajinovic before losing to Diego Schwartzman.

The close call with Evans was particularly encouraging to Koepfer. As he explains, “That gave me a lot of belief to hang with Dan Evans on the grass. He loves that surface. That was definitely a turning point. It showed me I am right there with these guys if I compete hard and play my best. I had lost in the last round of qualifying last year at Wimbledon in a five set heartbreaker so being able to skip qualifying this year and play Krajinovic was definitely one of the better draws I could have gotten on grass. It was the first main draw Grand Slam that I had played. And it helped my belief that I had won the Challenger in Ilkley.”

Over the summer, he qualified for the ATP 250 tournament in Los Cabos, Mexico and played well against Taylor Fritz. He also made it to the final of the Challenger in Aptos, California, losing a hard fought duel with Steve Johnson.

“I played a decent match against Fritz.” he asserts, “He just served better than me. Against Stevie I played decent as well and it was just a couple of points here and there where I could have won it. I knew things would go my way eventually if I showed my competitiveness every day and that happened at the US Open.”

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Koepfer got through three qualifying rounds at the cost of only one set in New York. In the main draw, he ousted world No. 97 Jaume Munar, No. 42 Reilly Opelka and No. 18 Nikoloz Basilashvili before losing, 3-6, 6-3, 6-2, 7-6 (2), to No. 5 seed Medvedev. That string of triumphs took Koepfer into uncharted territory.

“Playing [Opelka] in the second round kind of helped me because I had played [him] several times. I wasn’t nervous. I knew what to expect. I was putting a lot of returns in play which I think drove him a little crazy. Basilashvili hits the ball so hard. I was trying to put balls in play and run and fight for every point. I thought I played really well. My nerves were gone after the first round.”

Taking on Medvedev, Koepfer says, “I thought I played really well the entire match but my energy level dropped from the middle of the second set through the entire third set. I took a bathroom break and told myself to leave it all out there and fight hard. I got the fourth set into a tie-break that didn’t go my way.”

Koepfer was aware that Medvedev had experienced an unforgettable summer campaign and had alienated fans with his behavior starting in his third round confrontation with Feliciano Lopez. When he played Koepfer, the fans were highly charged and not enamored of Medvedev. After winning, Medvedev was booed. He raised his palms up facetiously, thanking them in his post-match interview for raising his incentive to win the match.

Asked about that, Koepfer says, “I was kind of knowing what was going to happen walking into that match. He got booed but the crowd was pretty fair to both of us during the match. Some were for me as the underdog. It was definitely a fun atmosphere to play in. When I was up a set and 2-0, I knew going up two sets would be a big advantage. But 2-0 in a set doesn’t mean anything against him. He makes pretty much every return. He stands so far back, floating the return back in and just  running. He doesn’t give you a lot of free points. I was pretty tired near the end because it was my seventh match including the qualifying. He was pretty tired also, but he did a good job of not showing me how tired he was.”

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Reflecting on the benefits of going so far at a Grand Slam tournament, Koepfer points out, “It is obviously a huge step in the right direction for me. Now I can play ATP Tour-level tournaments. I am in Asia right now and am going to play a 250 [he was beaten today in the first round of Zhuhai by wildcard Zhizhen Zhang after qualifying for that tournament], a 500 and a Masters 1000 for the first time. It is definitely life changing the run I had at the US Open. I can now play the high-level tournaments and get better opportunities every week to keep pushing my ranking even higher up. Going to the Top 50 is the next goal for me. Right now my ranking at No. 85 is right in between playing Challengers or getting into ATP tournaments, but I am very excited to play the Asian Swing and maybe go play in Europe after that.”

It seems safe to say that Koepfer is on his way to realizing larger dreams. But he would not be where he is without having played college tennis.

Speaking of making the decision of going to Tulane, he says, “It was a pretty easy choice because I wasn’t playing a lot in the juniors. I played one junior ITF tournament and lost in the first round of qualies. That was it. So I didn’t have a good ranking to be recruited. None of the bigger schools wanted me. I had to use a connection I had who knew the head coach of Tulane. Tulane was the only D-1 offer on the table that I had. I was able to play No. 1 almost from the beginning of college and that helped me to play a lot of matches against good players. The head coach Mark Booras did a really good job with the team.”

Looking back on that period, Koepfer says unhesitatingly, “Winning the National Indoors in 2015 brought me in the position to be No. 1 in college tennis for pretty much four months in a row leading up to the NCAA Championships. That was a big step . It meant a lot to me.”

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These days, Koepfer is guided by former American player Rhyne Williams, a 28-year-old who reached No. 141 in the world six years ago.

Koepfer says of his coach, “Rhyne sees a lot of things and has helped me a lot with the tennis stuff and the mental side. He had the same issues I have had, freaking out sometimes.”

Koepfer has a first-rate two-handed backhand that he can flatten out beautifully. It was apparent watching him play Medvedev at the Open that his lefty serve could be a larger weapon and his forehand could be more consistent.

“For sure that is true,” he says. “The lefty serve I definitely need to work on, and I will focus on it in the off-season. I know I am not the tallest guy, but having a good lefty serve is a big advantage. I need to be able to hit all the spots. I love hitting slider serves and kick serves but I am not very confident with my flat serves, even though that has gotten much better over the last few months. The forehand for sure can get better.”

All in all, Dominik Koepfer has every reason to be delighted with the progress he has made and the potential he has to lift his tennis to a loftier level. Koepfer concludes, “For sure I think there is a lot of room for me to improve. I need to keep competing like I have been. There are a lot of things to build on and achieve. I am excited to get these opportunities to play on the biggest stages and play bigger and better players, to prove myself even more and go higher in the rankings. I feel I can do that.”