NEW YORK — A little after midday Friday, Zheng Qinwen, who has felt the weight of an Olympic gold medal around her neck and a Grand Slam final on her shoulders, collapsed on the green acrylic of Stadium 17 at the U.S. Open and roared with delight.

In a match held over from Thursday’s thunderstorms at Flushing Meadows, the 2024 Paris Olympic champion defeated Russia’s Elena Pridankina 6-4, 3-6, 6-0. The win, her third of the week, sent Zheng into the main draw of the year’s fourth Grand Slam.

That’s territory Zheng, the 23-year-old from China, seemed able to take for granted in the afterglow of her Olympic glory, which followed a run to the 2024 Australian Open final. Then came a persistent right elbow injury. Surgery. Rehab. Comebacks that turned right back into layoffs. A tumble down the rankings to world No. 121. Early-round defeats that left her struggling to see how she would find her way back.

In New York, it all came out.

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Scenes of joy, despair, triumph and disaster played out across the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center on the final day of a part of the tournament that occupies a curious place in its wider context. Qualifying is the backbone of what the U.S. Open has labeled “Fan Week.” It’s free to attend. It’s a fun and accessible way to see elite tennis, especially in a year with surging resale ticket prices for the main event.

It can also be the difference between sporting and financial survival for its competitors, a mixture of up-and-coming talents, players living in the lower echelons of the sport, and boldface names who, through injury, loss of form, burnout, or just about anything that can get in the way, are trying to find their form and themselves again.

A loss in the first round of qualifying earns $32,000 — far from enough to navigate a year on the circuit. Elimination in the third round earns $66,000. But a berth in the first round of the main draw? That earns $140,000. So, across Thursday and Friday, the winner of each mini-bracket into the main event earns more than double the losers. That’s a whole lot of pressure. In qualifying, the emotions of tennis might be more keenly felt than even a Grand Slam final.

Just ask Chris O’Connell and Zsombor Piros. O’Connell, 32, broke into the top 100 — and got out of the qualifying rat race — a few years ago. After a run of direct entries, the Australian has found himself back in it for this year. He lost in the third round at Wimbledon.

Piros, 26, only earned enough ranking points to play qualifiers for the first time this year. The Hungarian lost in the second round at Wimbledon.

Friday, they met in the third round. Down the stretch of a tight second set, and holding a one-set lead, O’Connell worked Piros around, sent an inside-out forehand deep into the corner of the court and got an overhead. Put it away, and he would be up 5-4 and serving for a place back where he wants to be.

He stretched. He connected. He made it. And his left ankle crumpled underneath him.

O’Connell sat up. He gestured to his team. He walked, then hunched, then limped his way to the side of the court. He kicked his racket, took off his shoe, sat at the side of the court and wept. The trainer came. Then, he did balancing exercises to check the joint’s strength.

The decisions echoed around his head. Try to serve it out, and he might make the main draw, with the extra $74,000 and some recovery time. He also could worsen the injury, end his season and put himself in an even worse position.

Through it all, Piros sat and waited. McConnell decided to play on, but he was a passenger. After somehow getting to a tiebreak, he couldn’t hold Piros off. He couldn’t play a third set. He retired and limped to the side of the court to contemplate what had been snatched away. Piros, into the main draw of a Grand Slam for the first time, went to see his coaches and supporters at the side of the court.

It was his turn to weep then.

Tristan Schoolkate, another Australian, defeated Canada’s Liam Draxl in a 10-point match tiebreak and collapsed on his back when it was over before hanging a towel over his head to let out the tears. Kristina Liutova, the first WTA player born in the 2010s to win a tour title, looked at her support team in disbelief more than joy after qualifying for her first major.

Then there was Bianca Andreescu, the 2019 U.S. Open champion, who has been grinding her way through the second rung of women’s tennis to try and rebuild her ranking and her confidence after a cruel run of injury setbacks. She knows what it’s like to twist an ankle on the edge of victory. She did it in 2025, at her home tournament, the Canadian Open, holding match point against two-time major singles champion Barbora Krejčíková.

Andreescu laughed and cried all at once. She managed to win the match, but couldn’t recover in time for the next one.

On Friday afternoon, she led Slovenia’s Tamara Zidanšek by a set and a break. Then it all went wrong again. In the second set, Andreescu took a medical timeout in which a trainer checked her vitals. In the third, an ankle injury left her unable to cover the court. Andreescu kicked her racket to the side, just as O’Connell had done. She came close to tears at the side of the court. She continued to the end, but Zidanšek held her nerve, and Andreescu left the court with a trainer when it was done.

Scenes like this will play out when the tournament main draw starts Sunday. There will be injuries, there will be misfortune, there will be joy, and there will be sadness. But during qualifying, this liminal space of Fan Week lightness and bitter competition, the emotions of tennis are at their height.