WASHINGTON \u2014 In a tournament that features rising stars and decorated Grand Slam champions, including Naomi Osaka and Venus Williams, the eyes of many fans are focused on one player: Frances Tiafoe.<\/p>\n
Tiafoe, a Hyattsville native and product of the Junior Tennis Champions Center in College Park, made his 10th appearance at the Mubadala DC Open on Monday. The tournament isn\u2019t like any other for Tiafoe, who enjoys perhaps more crowd support in this venue than anywhere else on tour.<\/p>\n
However, Tiafoe\u2019s homecoming came to an unceremonious end in an opening-round loss (6-4, 3-6, 4-6) to Terence Atmane. It is Atmane\u2019s first career victory over Tiafoe and Tiafoe\u2019s earliest loss in Washington since 2021. Atmane will face Alejandro Tabilo, who defeated Tallon Griekspoor, 7-6(3), 4-6, 6-4, on Monday morning, in the Round of 16.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have a little more edge in this tournament, for sure,\u201d said Tiafoe, the No. 6 seed, on Saturday ahead of his first-round match. \u201cI know everyone so well. All my friends, family are coming to the event. Wanting to put my name around the stadium.<\/p>\n
\u201cKnowing the owner of the event, knowing everybody else, it\u2019s a lot. You want to do well. You want to win. It\u2019s great to be here and great to be, quote, unquote, one of the marquee guys coming. Yeah, you get a little nervous, but I mean, it\u2019s part of it, and it\u2019s a great experience.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tiafoe talked of his motivation to win the event that he once snuck into as a kid. Entering year 10 at his home event, Tiafoe expressed appreciation for both the tournament\u2019s growth and the immense support he receives each year.<\/p>\n
While the fan support was there again this year, Tiafoe\u2019s play didn\u2019t match his expectations.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cI mean, look, I play every year, and I never performed how I have today,\u201d he said. \u201cI was flat. Just wasn\u2019t good enough. You know, give him credit, but I definitely helped him over the line. Very disappointing. Especially for the year that I\u2019ve been having, super disappointing. Honestly, that\u2019s all I can really say. I had a lot of high hopes. Yeah, this one hurts a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tiafoe had reached at least the quarterfinals in four straight tournaments and entered Washington enjoying a strong 2026 campaign (31-13). Perfect holding serve in the first set, Tiafoe was broken late in the second and was unable to generate any breaks on Atmane\u2019s serve.<\/p>\n
The third set was also neck-and-neck with both players exchanging breaks in the opening four games. All even at 4-4 in the third, Atmane delivered a resounding break at love, and served out the match in the next game.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was just really ready to die on that game to win every single point,\u201d Atmane said. \u201cI think that\u2019s what worked for me. As soon as I was up love-40 \u2014 I remember the scenario that happened in Miami to get to the quarterfinal when I had also the same love-40 at 4-4 in the final set, and I lost 6-4. In my head it was a little bit like, you know, I cannot do the same mistake twice.\u201d<\/p>\n
Before his opening-round match, Tiafoe discussed a mindset shift, highlighting how he was comparatively closed off to years past. Yet, it didn\u2019t lead to the improved results he sought.<\/p>\n
Tiafoe\u2019s tournament isn\u2019t completely over, though, as he\u2019ll play doubles alongside Nick Kyrgios on Tuesday night in another marquee night match against JJ Tracy and Francisco Cabral.<\/p>\n
Have a news tip? Contact Jacob Steinberg at jsteinberg@baltsun.com<\/a>, 443-442-9445 and\u00a0x.com\/jacobstein23<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WASHINGTON \u2014 In a tournament that features rising stars and decorated Grand Slam champions, including Naomi Osaka and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":790687,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[33552,15511,99,428,58307],"class_list":["post-790686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-dc-open","tag-frances-tiafoe","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-terence-atmane"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/790686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=790686"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/790686\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/790687"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=790686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=790686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=790686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}