{"id":322847,"date":"2025-12-03T14:40:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-03T14:40:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/322847\/"},"modified":"2025-12-03T14:40:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-03T14:40:08","slug":"breakout-tennis-star-amanda-anisimova-set-to-return-to-n-j-for-exhibition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/322847\/","title":{"rendered":"Breakout tennis star Amanda Anisimova set to return to N.J. for exhibition"},"content":{"rendered":"

Amanda Anisimova left Freehold, N.J. when she was 3 because her family wanted her older sister Maria to pursue a tennis career in Florida.<\/p>\n

Maria went on to play college tennis at the University of Pennsylvania, while Amanda eventually eclipsed her big sister on the tennis court. Now Amanda is returning to New Jersey for an exhibition on Sunday at Prudential Center.<\/p>\n

Anisimova, ranked No. 4 in the world after reaching the finals of both Wimbledon and the U.S. Open in 2025, will meet fellow American and world No. 6 Jessica Pegula in “A Racquet At The Rock<\/a>” beginning at 5:30 p.m. World No. 1 Carlos Alcaraz takes on No. 30 Frances Tiafoe in the men\u2019s match that night.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m super excited to be coming back to Jersey,\u201d Anisimova told NJ Advance Media in a Zoom interview Tuesday from Miami, where she\u2019s training. \u201cI haven\u2019t been in a really long time, and just to connect with my roots and the people from there. A lot of my fans are from New Jersey, so I\u2019m really looking forward to it. The event is going to be really special and I\u2019m really excited for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Anisimova, 24, is coming off a breakout year in which she reached back-to-back Grand Slam finals. At Wimbledon, she stunned world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka<\/a>, 6-4, 4-6, 6-4, in the semifinals to reach her first major final. Anisimova suffered a disheartening 6-0, 6-0 loss to Iga Swiatek in the final, but managed to rebound and make another deep run at the U.S. Open. <\/p>\n

In the semifinals in New York, she defeated four-time major champion Naomi Osaka<\/a> 6-7(4), 7-6(3), 6-3 in a classic that lasted 2 hours, 56 minutes and ended at 12:54 a.m. Friday.<\/p>\n

Anisimova then lost to Sabalenka in the final, 6-3, 7-6(3), in a jam-packed Arthur Ashe Stadium as the world No. 1 defended her title.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think that I would have imagined that happening so soon because it\u2019s only really my first full year back on tour,\u201c Anisimova said. \u201dAnd it\u2019s been an incredible year for me, super special. And just being able to have gotten all the way to the finals back-to-back is an incredible achievement. And it was a lot of fun and very memorable. And just the fact that I was able to do that so quickly, I think, definitely surprised me, but also has motivated me a lot especially going into next year and setting new goals for myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Born in Freehold, N.J. to parents who immigrated from Russia, Anisimova won the US Open Juniors at 15, defeating Coco Gauff in the final. She reached the French Open semifinals in 2019 when she was 17.<\/p>\n

She battled COVID and various injuries and then took a mental health break from the tour from May 2023-June 2024.<\/p>\n

She said \u201cit was definitely a thought in my head\u201d that she might be done with tennis.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I always felt like there were so many things I still wanted to achieve in the sport, like winning a Grand Slam, or just reaching a higher ranking,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd I\u2019m still so young, so I felt like it would be a bit disappointing to leave the sport so early. So that\u2019s why I just took the time that I needed to kind of reset and regroup and then come back when I was ready, which is what I did.\u201d<\/p>\n

After she beat Sabalenka to reach the Wimbledon final, 18-time major champion Chrissie Evert said on ESPN:<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, every tennis player will want to take eight months off, let me tell you. If you\u2019re going to come back and play like that, that was awesome how she held her nerve.\u201d<\/p>\n

For now, Anisimova is looking forward to returning to New Jersey and then to challenging for her first Grand Slam at the Australian Open next month.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo have a fellow American alongside me [Sunday] is going to be a lot of fun,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd I\u2019m really looking forward to the men\u2019s match, too.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Amanda Anisimova left Freehold, N.J. when she was 3 because her family wanted her older sister Maria to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":322848,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[6603,49,48,82,593,75181],"class_list":["post-322847","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-6603","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-wspix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322847","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=322847"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322847\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/322848"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=322847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=322847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=322847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}