In ATPTour.com’s series, Sliding Tour Moment, a host of top players reflect on a career defining experience, one that they look back on as pivotal in their journey through tennis. This week, Botic van de Zandschulp recalls his breakthrough run to the quarter-finals of the US Open in 2021. Read all instalments of Sliding Tour Moment here.
One of the biggest matches of Botic van de Zandschulp’s career came with an unlikely voice in his ear.
The Dutchman had raced into a two-set lead against Diego Schwartzman in the fourth round of the 2021 US Open, only to see the Argentine fight back and force a decider. After missing two match points in the fourth set, van de Zandschulp headed to the locker room to change his clothes before the fifth. What he heard only fuelled his determination.
“I was two sets up and then had match points, but I lost the third and fourth sets,” Van de Zandschulp recalled to ATPTour.com. “Then I went to the locker to change clothes and everything. It was pretty funny: I was changing my clothes, and the TV was on.
“The commentators were like, ‘Ah, it’s going to be tough. He had chances in the third and fourth. How is he going to come back in the fifth?’ I was changing my clothes and hearing what they were saying. I was glad I came out well in the fifth!”
Rather than letting the words add to his doubts, Van de Zandschulp used them as fuel. He was playing the biggest match of his career at the time, on his US Open debut, and doing so as the World No. 117 against the 11th seed, who had already reached the quarter-finals in New York twice.
Instead of allowing the moment to overwhelm him, the commentary only sharpened his focus.
“It was more to prove I'm going to come back out and I'm gonna show that it didn't affect me that much,” Van de Zandschulp, who eventually prevailed 6-3, 6-4, 5-7, 5-7, 6-1, said. “Maybe at the beginning of my career, I wouldn't have had the mental strength to do it.”
Van de Zandschulp backed up those words emphatically. The then-25-year-old broke early in the deciding set, broke again for 5-1 and, after seeing two more match points slip away in the final game, finally sealed the four-hour, 20-minute marathon with his 15th ace.
Botic van de Zandschulp defeats Diego Schwartzman in five sets at the US Open in 2021. Photo: Elsa/Getty Images
Having earned his main-draw spot by winning three rounds of qualifying, Van de Zandschulp defeated Top-20 opponents Casper Ruud and Schwartzman during his statement run. Despite defeat to eventual champion Daniil Medvedev in the quarter-finals, he left New York having climbed from No. 117 to No. 62 in the PIF ATP Rankings, cracking the Top 100 for the first time.
“Going into the quarters and going from No. 117 in the rankings to No. 62, it completely changes which tournaments you’re playing,” Van de Zandschulp said. “The whole Tour changes for you. That match was probably the biggest turning point in my career.
“Sometimes that's the tough part about tennis: you don't have so long to enjoy those moments. I did unbelievably well, but four or five days later, I was in Uruguay. I was playing in the Davis Cup. But for my family and everyone, it's different. They had more time to realise and it sunk in. But it was a great feeling.”
The run had not come completely out of nowhere. Van de Zandschulp had spent the previous year edging closer to the Top 100, reaching the final of an ATP Challenger in Ismaning and the semi-finals another Challenger Hamburg before a positive COVID-19 test forced him to withdraw from the latter.
By 2021, the breakthrough was gathering pace as he qualified for three Grand Slam main draws that season, while he competed at Wimbledon as a lucky loser, and had already beaten Hubert Hurkacz, then World No. 20, from two sets down at Roland Garros.
“Before the US Open I felt good. I won a lot of matches in Europe,” Van de Zandschulp said. “I was seeded in qualies. That year I qualified for all the Slams, and won some rounds, so I think tennis wise, I was playing well. It was only the ranking that was not Top 100 yet, but I felt like it was coming that year.
“Before the match [against Schwartzman], I actually felt really good. I didn't really have any nerves and I started unbelievably well, winning the first two sets.”
Botic van de Zandschulp was competing as the No. 117 player in the PIF ATP Rankings in New York in 2021. Photo: Elsa/Getty Images
The next day, Van de Zandschulp faced Medvedev in the quarter-finals and pushed the eventual champion to four sets, taking the only set Medvedev dropped on his way to the title.
Looking back, though, it was the match before it that Van de Zandschulp identifies as the real turning point. Not simply because it delivered his first Grand Slam quarter-final, but because it showed him he could withstand the kind of pressure that once might have overwhelmed him.
The ranking rise opened new doors, and the belief continued to grow. Van de Zandschulp has since reached a career-high World No. 22 in 2022, contested three ATP Tour finals and recorded standout Lexus ATP Head2Head wins over the likes of Carlos Alcaraz and Novak Djokovic.
It all traces back to a fifth set in New York and a few words from a television in a locker room that he was never supposed to hear.
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