Miracle Melanie Winning Mind Games

NEW YORK -- It takes a little time to break them down, to chop them down. But Melanie Oudin keeps chopping relentlessly. Nadia Petrova was five points from eliminating tennis' newest teen sweetheart/killer from the U.S. Open Monday.

And then: Tim ... berrrr.

Miracle Melanie did it again. No. 13 Petrova fell, and Oudin moved to the quarterfinals, winning 1-6, 7-6 (7-2), 6-3 at Ashe Stadium.

"If they're going to beat me, they're going to (have to) beat me," Oudin said. "Because I'm not going to go anywhere."

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Something special is happening here. Oudin, the 17-year old from Georgia, has stolen this tournament, stolen the biggest tennis stadium in the world.

She is such a fresh story. She is the ultimate underdog story, an American kid coming out of nowhere.

"Everyone stood up when I had my first match point," she said. "Just when I won the second set, a standing ovation. I mean, it's crazy how many people are cheering for me ...

"This is so great for American tennis."

Yes, American tennis has been held up solely by the Williams sisters for years. The Russians were taking over the women's game, including the No. 1 ranking. And in the oddest of things, this little, 5-foot-6 American kid has beaten a Russian in all four matches.

She has made habit of knocking off big, strong Russians.

"Hopefully," Petrova said, joking, "she gets a short, chubby Russian. See how she handles that."

Next up is No. 9 Caroline Wozniacki from Denmark, who squeaked past No. 6 Svetlana Kuznetsova from, yes, Russia in a tiebreaker Monday night, ending the run of Russians she'll face in the Open.

But these Russians have not been a gift to Oudin. The real gift is that the fighters on tour, the Williams sisters and Kim Clijsters, are all on the other side of the draw from her.

She has arrived at just the perfect time, when the women have embarrassed themselves, choking time and again throughout this Open. They are giving a bad name to women.

And when I paint the picture of Oudin chopping down players, well, that sounds like a physical thing. It is not.

She is attacking their brains, their souls, their nervous systems.

If this were boxing, she would be the little guy absorbing and surviving huge knockout-type blows early, and then peppering away with body shots, wearing the big guy out. Only she isn't working the body, but an even weaker point of the women on tour.

The brain.

Not to spoil a good party, but I don't think this will work against a real champion. I don't see Serena Williams folding like this to Oudin.

But anyway, did you see the look on Oudin's face this time? Her look is changing.

After she beat No. 4 Elena Dementieva and after she beat Maria Sharapova, she had this wide-eyed look of disbelief. Not this time. On Monday, Oudin did what is becoming her trademark, raising her arms to her head, dropping her racquet and bending back. But the eyes had an edge this time.

In other words, she is getting even tougher as the tournament goes on.

"There were no tears," she said, "I believed that I could do it. Now I know that I do belong here. This is what I want to do, and I can compete with these girls no matter who I'm playing."

Her other trademark is the word "Believe" stamped on her shoe. Just a few days ago, Adidas said it wasn't going to offer an Oudin shoe with that word.

Want to bet they rethink that one?

If you saw Monday's match, you saw that Oudin, No. 70 in the world, keeps beating these top players in the same way.

Three matches in a row now, against seeded players, she has lost the first set, and then come back to win. Think about that. The best players in the world cannot close the deal.

"I sometimes just start off slowly, I guess," she said. "Maybe I'm a little nervous and all this stuff."


Hah! No way.

The thing is, in the first set, these top players are still mentally strong. It takes time for Oudin to break them down.

And she is doing it in the classic way, by mixing up paces and spins, playing defense and then offense. Moving the ball around. Drill one, dink one, drop shot, lob ...

In other words, she's playing tennis, which is the opposite of nearly every woman on tour.

They all have exactly the same style, hitting hard and somewhat flat. You can find a rhythm against that.

You can't against Oudin.

So Petrova was serving with two game points to go up 6-1, 5-3 Monday. This was a blowout. But Oudin got back to deuce with two nice forehands down the line -- her best shot. On deuce, both players stayed back and belted the ball until Petrova missed. On game point, Oudin ran down two backhands and sliced back defensively, and then Petrova missed.

Petrova was still on the verge of winning by blowout, yet it was over. Oudin had won.

One tiny crack of doubt gets into the heads of these players, and Oudin, basically, eats her opponents alive. They can't have doubt and lose rhythm while Oudin keeps running everything down.

She is intimidating the best players in the world.

But the second game of the third set, crunch time, Petrova was throwing her racquet.

Why didn't we see this from Oudin before now, during the tour this summer? Because the doubts don't creep into top players' heads much during non-majors.

So the miracle continues, though it's not really a miracle. And here's a prediction for her match Wednesday:

Tim ... berrr.

Email me at gregcouch09@aol.com