They Said What? U.S. Open Champions Edition

NEW YORK—Volumes and volumes of words are spoken during a Grand Slam tournament, and it would be a Herculean task to sift through them all to find the most intriguing. So let’s just take the most interesting or thought-provoking things said by the champions in their respective final press conferences, and toast the feats they just completed:

“Yes, absolutely. I might be too motivated. I train really hard and I never want to stop. Then sometimes I ask Patrick (Mouratoglou, her coach), ‘Is this normal?’ He says, ‘No, it's not normal.’ Because I didn't think so. ‘Tell me I'm not crazy.’ He's like, ‘You are.’”—Womens’ singles champion Serena Williams, when asked if she was “self-motivating.”

Williams just won her 18th major, leaving her tied with Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova, all three in second place on the roll of women who played exclusively in the Open era. On the men’s side, Roger Federer is already the all-time Grand Slam singles champion (17 titles). He was beaten in the semifinals of the tournament by eventual champ Marin Cilic. Williams will be 33 in a matter of days; Federer is already there. Isn’t it amazing that we have two champions who are not just so accomplished, but still so enthusiastic and dangerous?

“I think the guys from second line were a bit lucky because Andy Murray was having trouble with his back; Wawrinka was up and down with his tennis after Australia. A few other players were not playing at the best all the time. And Rafa is not here. So that opened a little bit the gate for everybody else.”—Marin Cilic, men’s singles champ, on whether or not this final represented a “changing of the guard.”

Cilic, who was seeded No. 14, gave a good, honest answer to the question on everyone’s mind this week. Still, talking about a new generation taking over seems absurd when you consider the resumes, ages, and recent results of the Big Four. Yet the continuing physical vulnerability of Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray, along with the advancing age of Federer, certainly provides food for thought. Perhaps the solution is to expand the category to a Big Six, or the Hummin’ Half-a-Dozen, with Stan Wawrinka and Cilic added to the Big Four.

“To win that first Slam, I remember flying over the English Channel to Queen's, and I was most scared I have ever been that the plane was gonna crash. It's like, ‘We have done it, and now I'm going to go down in a ball of flames for some reason.’ I just want to enjoy this for a little bit.”—Bob Bryan, talking about his flight from Paris to London after the Bryans won the first Grand Slam title of their careers at Roland Garros in 2003.

The Bryans won their 100th career title at the U.S. Open, and added to their historic record in other ways—they have now won a Slam in each of the last 10 years; they own a record 16 overall. Revelations like the one quoted above point to the absolute passion the Bryans have for the game, which is the most potent of all the powerful forces that enabled them to achieve this feat.

“I saw Serena this morning in the locker room. We had lockers next to each other. I saw her and she said, ‘Are you playing final today?’ I'm like, ‘Yes.’ She looked straight at me in my eyes, she's like, ‘Go for it, because you really deserve it.’ I was like, ‘Ahhhh. . . thank you.’”—Elena Vesnina, who partnered with Ekaterina Makarova to win the women’s doubles title over Martina Hingis and Flavia Pennetta.

Makarova and Vesnina were seeded fourth, while Hingis and Pennetta were unseeded. The top seeds, Sara Errani and Roberta Vinci, were upset in the second round, paving the way in the top half for Hingis and Pennetta to get through. In the bottom half, Makarova and Vesnina had to do the heavy lifting on their own when they faced off with the Williams sisters in the quarterfinals, although they had help from Kimiko Date-Krumm and Barbora Zahlavova Strycova, who upset No. 2 seeds Hsieh Su-Wei and Peng Shuai. While Serena’s comment to Vesnina was classy, keep in mind that if a champion is going to lose, he or she wants to lose to the person who won the event. Serena got her wish—if not a doubles trophy.

“Yeah, actually kind of in the third round maybe or fourth round I started to think about it in the back of my head, actually. ‘Imagine if I actually won singles and doubles.’ As I got closer, it started to get into my head. All I was thinking was ‘singles and doubles, singles and doubles.’ Winning those two. I was actually very happy.”—Omar Jasika, the 17-year-old Australian who won the boys’ singles despite being unseeded, then joined with Naoki Nakagawa of Japan to sweep the doubles.

Nick Kyrgios isn’t the only bright spot on Australia's tennis horizon. Pulling off a rare double, Jasika upset No. 5 seed Quentin Halys of France in the singles final, 2-6, 7-5, 6-1, then won the doubles as well. Jasika joined countrymen Pat Cash (1982) and Bernard Tomic (2009) on the roll of Australian junior U.S. Open singles champs. Cash said: “He is a little guy but he reminds me of Marcelo Rios, and Rios got to No. 1 in the world. He is a little lefty but he really hits the ball hard and fast. He has a good all round game and he works hard.”

“Yes, to be the first ever to win U.S. Open juniors, it's amazing feeling, you know. No one ever in history won that. Yeah, it's great.”—Marie Bouzkova, the unseeded, 16-year-old Czech who earned the girls’ singles title the hard way, beating four seeds en route to the win.

Okay, so Bouzkova isn’t the “first ever” to win the Girls’ title. She meant that she’s the first Czech girl to have done it, which is surprising enough when you look at the quality players the nation has produced. Bouzkova upset No. 2 seed Jelena Ostapenko in the first round, then took out two more seeds before she finished her work with a final-round win over No. 9 seed Anhelina Kalinina. “Czech Republic has, you know, top players,” Bouzkova said afterward. “We're a small country. We have so many good players. It just really gives me motivation also that I can be good. I look up to Petra Kvitova and Tomas Berdych. It gives me confidence.”

“The girl's gonna play a lot more balls. The guys have to try and intercept. I think whoever does that better and tries to, you know, protect the girl at the volley a little bit, does better. I think that's why we did well together. You have to basically put the return in, try to get it deep, you know, to the guy's feet or whoever is serving to the feet. I think that's how you combine really in mixed doubles. I think everyone goes all out for the girl.”—Sania Mirza, explaining the fine art of mixed doubles after she and Bruno Soares won the event.

Mixed doubles is a fascinating event in its own right; it’s a pity that the plate at any given tournament is already over-crowded with standard singles and doubles. In the final, top-seeded Mirza and Soares meet the unseeded team of Abigail Spears and Santiago Gonzalez. The final was a thriller, with the top seeds winning 6-1, 2-6, (11-9). As you can see, mixed doubles uses the match tiebreaker. That’s a shame, but this isn’t the time and place to quibble about that.