Rafael Nadal beat Ivo Karlovic tonight in a compelling third-set tiebreaker, capping a 5-7, 6-1, 7-6 (7) victory. It wasn't tennis for the ages, but the match built to a knife-edge conclusion. When it was done, Nadal sat down on the court, pumped his fists in glee, then just about bounced to the net to shake his opponent's hand.
Afterwards, Nadal admitted he'd felt "lot of tension, because the match can be decided for two points, one point..." He said he thought he'd played at a high level, but even so he knew he could have gone out.
The first two hours of the match were the appetizer, and the third set tiebreaker the main course. Karlovic broke Nadal once at the end of the first set, crushing two inside-out forehands for winners. Nadal responded with two breaks of his own early in the second set, stopping Karlovic's momentum dead. Then neither player could apply any pressure to his opponent's serve in the final set, so we went to tennis' version of sudden death.
The tiebreak twisted and turned, but it's worth noting that Nadal was never once behind in it. He gained minibreaks at 0-0, 2-2, and 6-6: Karlovic was able to get to parity after each of those points, but he could never get ahead, and if you don't get the lead in a tiebreak, you can't win it.
When they began the tiebreak, Nadal had won 92 points to Karlovic's 75. If you enter the last minute of a March Madness basketball game up 92-75, you're home and dry, but that's not the way the tennis scoring system works. Essentially, the scoreboard resets to zero, and with a big server like Roddick, Isner or Karlovic at the other end, one mistake on your own serve can be terminal. And Nadal didn't serve well himself in the tiebreak—his first serve slowed down and several went in the net. But it couldn't cost him unless Karlovic could get his nose in front.
Which he couldn't. Nadal gained the lead with a cross-court pass that Karlovic just touched with the tip of his racquet, but Karlovic leveled two points later with a backhand volley winner. A Nadal return at Karlovic's feet won a 3-2 advantage, but at 5-4 Karlovic gained control of the point and finished with another backhand volley. It looked over when Nadal hit the shot of the night at 6-6, a running forehand pass down the line into the corner, but again Karlovic came in to net and this time Nadal's attempted pass went long. At 7-7 Nadal controlled the point from the serve, finishing with a forehand winner: then, finally, Karlovic pulled a mid-court forehand wide.
At last, Nadal (and the vast majority of the crowd) could exult. And a Nadal-Del Potro semifinal on Saturday is big box office, so the tournament organizers also had reason to celebrate.
—Andrew Burton