{"id":892002,"date":"2026-09-11T17:18:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-11T17:18:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/892002\/"},"modified":"2026-09-11T17:18:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-11T17:18:10","slug":"what-frances-tiafoe-vs-ben-shelton-shows-about-american-tennis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/892002\/","title":{"rendered":"What Frances Tiafoe vs. Ben Shelton Shows About American Tennis"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tBen Shelton<\/a> and Frances Tiafoe<\/a> play in the U.S. Open semifinals on Friday night in an all-American showdown. The winner will get the opportunity Sunday to try to break the Grand Slam drought for American men, which stretches to Andy Roddick\u2019s 2003 U.S. Open title.<\/p>\n

\n\tRegardless of who wins, and whether they eventually hoist the trophy, the future is bright for U.S. men\u2019s tennis.<\/p>\n

\n\tThere are currently 14 American men in the top 100, more than any other country (France and Argentina are tied for second with 10). A decade ago, at the end of the 2016 ATP Tour season, there were only seven men from the U.S. in the top 100. Ten years before that, in 2006, there were eight.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\n\tTo find a time with more American depth in the top 100, you\u2019d have to go all the way back to when Ben Shelton\u2019s dad, Bryan Shelton, made the cut. At the end of the 1994 season, 19 of the top 100 men were American, including Bryan at No. 84.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe U.S. had more strength at the top back then, with Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi ranking No. 1 and No. 2 in the world, and Michael Chang not far behind at No. 6. But don\u2019t sleep on the high-end talent today. Six Americans rank in the top 20 of the live rankings\u2014Italy has three players, and no other country has more than two.<\/p>\n

\n\tShelton dismissed the notion that the American Grand Slam drought is weighing on players. \u201cI feel like I answer this question every press conference, for sure, especially here in New York,\u201d Shelton said in a press conference. \u201cI can\u2019t tell you the last time I\u2019ve thought about the American drought, other than, you know, being in these rooms.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe problem for American men of late hasn\u2019t been a lack of elite players\u2014it\u2019s been that the young duo of Spain\u2019s Carlos Alcaraz and Italy\u2019s Jannik Sinner, along with GOAT-contender Novak Djokovic thriving deep into his 30s, has simply been too dominant for anyone else to break through. That threesome claimed 15 consecutive Grand Slams before this year\u2019s French Open broke the streak when Alcaraz was injured and Sinner suffered from heat exhaustion.<\/p>\n

\n\tSinner ousted Ben Shelton in each of Shelton\u2019s last three Grand Slam quarterfinal runs. The previous time, Shelton lost to Novak Djokovic.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn Tiafoe\u2019s most recent major quarterfinal, he was dispatched by Alcaraz. The last time he made a major semifinal, at the 2024 U.S. Open, he narrowly lost to fellow countryman Taylor Fritz, who then lost to Sinner in the final. The time before that, he lost in five sets to Alcaraz.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe\u2019ve been doing pretty well. Someone is always going deep in majors,\u201d Tiafoe said in a press conference. \u201cFritz has been playing great for a long time, Ben and myself. We have Learner [Tien]. Obviously you have Alex Michelsen, Tommy [Paul]. There\u2019s a good group of us that are playing really good \u2026 I think U.S. tennis is in a great place.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn addition to the usual suspects who have lost to Alcaraz or Sinner late in a major, a plethora of young prospects are on the ascent. Michelsen, who just turned 22, served for the match against Tiafoe in the quarterfinals. Tien, still 20 years old, lost a tight five-setter in the fourth round to eventual semifinalist Karen Khachanov, and is up to No. 13 in the live rankings. Brandon Nakashima, age 25, accumulated more ranking points than any player during the pre-U.S. Open hard-court swing, and is up to No. 16. Ethan Quinn, Zachary Svajda and Michael Zheng have all reached the top 100 before turning 24 years old.<\/p>\n

\n\tIncluding the women, 10 Americans reached the fourth round at the 2026 U.S. Open, the most at any major since 2002. Although the women\u2019s final won\u2019t feature an American, Coco Gauff and Jessica Pegula each made the semis.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI mean, Serena has 95 slams,\u201d Tiafoe said jokingly. \u201cThe women\u2019s side, they\u2019ve been killing it for so long. It\u2019s not something new.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ben Shelton and Frances Tiafoe play in the U.S. Open semifinals on Friday night in an all-American showdown.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":892003,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[19369,49,48,122548,16006,82,593,2084],"class_list":["post-892002","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-ben-shelton","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-data-viz","tag-frances-tiafoe","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-us-open"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/892002","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=892002"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/892002\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/892003"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=892002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=892002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=892002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}