NEW YORK — Carlos Alcaraz hit a behind-the-back shot at the US Open to win a point in a 7-6 (3), 6-3, 6-4 victory over Arthur Rinderknech on Sunday that made the Spaniard the youngest man in the Open era to reach 13 Grand Slam quarterfinals.
“Sometimes, I practice it. I’m not going to lie,” the No. 2-seeded Alcaraz said about the bit of wizardry he delivered in the first set. “But I mean, I don’t practice it, like, too many times. Just in practice, if the opportunity is there, I will try. In the match, it’s kind of the same. If I have the opportunity, why not?”
At 22 years and 3 months old, Alcaraz is about 6 months younger than Boris Becker was when he got to major quarterfinal No. 13.
Alcaraz’s opponent on Tuesday will be No. 20 Jiri Lehecka, a 23-year-old from the Czech Republic. Lehecka advanced to his second Slam quarterfinal with a 7-6 (4), 6-4, 2-6, 6-2 win over Adrian Mannarino.
Alcaraz and Lehecka have played three times, with Alcaraz holding a 2-1 advantage. They have never met in a major.
“He’s one of the two biggest challenges right now in tennis,” Lehecka said. “He’s moving very well. He can serve big. He knows everything. His game is complete. … So for me I will just try to stick to the weapons that I have, to the weapons which worked for me in these last two matchups.”
Early on against Rinderknech, a Frenchman who played college tennis at Texas A&M, Alcaraz closed a love hold that made the score 2-all in spectacular fashion. Moving to his right at midcourt, Alcaraz found himself in what appeared to be a bad spot when Rinderknech wrong-footed him.
But Alcaraz wrapped his racket around his body and flicked a shot up the line.
Perhaps startled that the point wasn’t over, Rinderknech hit a volley that landed in the net. A big smile crossed Alcaraz’s face as he looked over at his coach, Juan Carlos Ferrero, in the stands. Alcaraz then placed his right index finger behind his ear, as if acknowledging the spectators’ cheers.
“The people like it; I like playing tennis like this,” Alcaraz said. “My style of tennis fits pretty well to the energy here.”
Alcaraz wound up taking that set in a tiebreaker. Then, midway through the second, Alcaraz produced another highlight-worthy effort with a no-look passing winner, racing forward to get to a short ball and glancing down the line as though he was going to hit to Rinderknech’s backhand, but instead steering a forehand cross-court.
By the last game, even Rinderknech was smiling at other next-level strokes by Alcaraz, who has won 54 of 55 service games through four matches this year at Flushing Meadows and has yet to drop a set. He claimed the title here in 2022 for the first of his five Grand Slam trophies.
Alcaraz is into his fourth major quarterfinal of 2025, the first time in his career he has gone 4-for-4 in that category in a season. He lost to Novak Djokovic at that stage at the Australian Open in January, won the French Open in June and lost to No. 1 Jannik Sinner in the final at Wimbledon in July.
Alcaraz has now won 34 of his past 35 tour-level matches, including 10 straight since the loss at Wimbledon. His victory Sunday was his 21st at the US Open, the third most by a man in his first five appearances at the New York major in the Open era. The only ones with more are John McEnroe (28) and Lleyton Hewitt (23).
ESPN Research and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
