How are the Americans fairing at Wimbledon this year? Ben Shelton and Taylor Fritz have fought their way to the Quarterfinals in the Championships. Kasey Hudson & Annabelle Hasselbeck review how the Americans are doing in the famous tennis tournament this year, and discuss the surprise surrounding Coco Gauff!
Find the full episode of Respect Her Game on NESN’s YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/WLAKcN1e1Io
GET NESN 360: https://nesn.com/download-the-nesn-app/
Subscribe on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/NESN
Twitter: https://twitter.com/NESN
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NESN/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nesn
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@nesn
Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/nesn/
#Wimbledon #CocoGauff #BenShelton
Hey, welcome back to Respect Your Game. We are just six days away from the Wim Wimbledon women’s final, but we have to get through the quarterfinals earlier this week first. And the exciting part of the women’s tournament is that whoever takes home the trophy on July 12th will be the ninth woman in the past nine years to do so. So, we are guaranteed a firsttime title winner, which is so exciting and so new and fun. And there are four more quarterfinal matches to be played Tuesday and Wednesday. And Arena Sabalanka made her 11th straight consecutive GL Grand Slam quarterfinal appearance. But the real headline that was turning heads was the shocking upsets that happened all throughout this tournament so far and notably Coco Goff eliminated in the first round. Casey, how surprising was this for you? Oh my gosh, I was so surprised and I know most fans are kind of reacting to she just won the French Open. How do you kind of come and drop out in the first round? But I remind fans that don’t psychotically watch tennis like those different surfaces, they matter and you can only game plan so much for them. And it’s been a big topic with Wimbledon in terms of just like, you know, last year I believe that there was a lot of heavy rain that they had to try to navigate. Whereas like rain is one facet of it. Humidity in the air is another facet of it. But then like the heat, welting grass changes exactly how you’re going to gain traction, how the ball manipulation is going to take place. So, um I don’t want to compare her previous success to the dropout in round one. the shock was still very much there because you’re talking about somebody that’s making all of the grand climbs in her career at such a tremendously young age. Um, but I did see the last time that she got knocked out of Wimbledon round one, she went on to win the US Open. So, we still have stuff to look forward to from Coco Goff. Totally. That could be a good sign. And it wasn’t just her. It was Madison Keys who won the Australian Open. She got eliminated. Koko Goff, obviously. Jessica Bugula got eliminated right off the bat. So, really a tough showing, too, for some of these top-seated players. And the last American to win Wimbledon was Serena Williams in 2016. So definitely a bummer. There were 19 American women who came into this tournament. So unfortunately we only have one left in that. But let’s hear what Koko Goff had to say after her loss and really reflecting on what that was. How much of this do you chalk up to, you know, grasping not the greatest environment for you and how much to just, you know, it’s been a hell of a few weeks since Paris? Um, I think a little bit of both. I think, um, I don’t know. I felt like mentally I was a little bit overwhelmed with everything that came afterwards. So, I didn’t feel like I had that t enough time to do I guess celebrate and then also like get back into it. But, um, you know, it’s the first time in of this experience of like coming off a win and having to play Wimbledon and I definitely learned a lot of what I would and would not do again. Um, but yeah, I mean also she played great. I mean I saw the draw and knew it would be a tough match for me and I mean I think obviously I played her on clay and I think that surfaced suits me a little bit better and it was still a tough three setter. So um yeah, I knew today would be tough and I had chances but um yeah, it is what it is. I love I just want to start I love with how she gave her opponent flowers, right? that was a point of contention in other competitions that she’s kov has competed in not on her but on her opponents right and so it’s it’s cool to see her kind of like take that step and be like hey I’m going to reflect and give my opponent some credit there but yeah just to hear her talk about the other tournaments that she’s played in and how that really had an effect on you know her preparation for this I was kind of shocked too that she brought it even back to that so it was really interesting to know like what her perspective was here on that and how the mental side of it almost overwhelmed her more than anything. Yeah. To be able to flip that switch. I mean, I honestly couldn’t imagine where she had to try to find that hard pivot in her mentality because you do want to celebrate. I mean, all of us were celebrating on her behalf because of what it means not only to her, but to her career and for her to be the first of in comparison to women that she idolized. You know, Serena Williams is somebody that she has talked about on numerous occasions, how she tried to replicate aspects of her game and like now she’s kind of stepping into really big shoes and again doing it very young. So, I can’t imagine what that mental switch is like. But, uh, back to what you said, crediting your opponent. Tennis is a very hard one. You don’t really hear them give too much like genuine credit to their opponents. And it’s because of the mental hurdle that’s required in tennis, but for her to mention like, hey, we played on clay and it was still a tough match. So, like I’m not surprised by this happening at Wimbledon, but it just shows you how short, how small the margin of error is. And it could be the surface or it could just be you not being mentally attuned either from the first set to the last set. Right. Definitely. And even when you know, you went back to saying, “Hey, after this loss, she’s probably potentially going to win the next couple tournaments and ma in matches.” Just thinking back to what her schedule probably looked like. We don’t know. We weren’t there when they’re training, but like when you win, that comes with a lot of awesome new things. Things that aren’t usually in your training schedule for tournaments like, ad shoots, marketing, media, fun events, right? Like there’s other things that you want to go to. And also, not only just physically be there and be present for those things, but also like mentally that space. You need to be able to like bask in a win for sure. But then, you know, the hungry, what’s that? The hungry the wolf at the bottom of the mountain is hungry than the wolf at the top of the mountain. like there’s a little bit of that too and she didn’t explicitly say you know like I my mind wasn’t right but in a sense I think it was that balance of hey how much do I let this win carry me and how much do I not how much do I celebrate how much do I go ahead and turn the page and actually I love that you uh added some emphasis to that part because if you look at it like for instance I don’t believe don’t hold me to this but I’m pretty sure from what I saw I don’t think Ben Shelton competed in the French Open there’s a number of players that will decide not to do the French Open. They’ll go do smaller tournaments that are already in England to a be on that time schedule to start getting a routine there and to just really kind of like hone specific skill sets for their larger opponents that are coming up. I mean, Taylor Fritz is somebody we’ll talk about shortly, but like you know, some people really have to curtail their schedule throughout a season to say, I’m going to do these big tournaments. I’m going to do these small ones because the turnaround between a French Open, a Wimbledon, a US Open, you have to have a really big team backing you and keeping you in such a structured routine so that you can mentally flip the page and show up as your ultimate best player. Definitely. I think people forget like they don’t live here, right? There’s a time zone change. Like there’s a lot of other factors that go into it. Even what we were talking about earlier with the surfaces, some players game is curated more towards grass verse clay and vice versa, right? So that’s a, you know, part that I know a lot of the players have talked about. But I do want to jump to other headlines that were made because a former Wimbledon champion, Maria Sherupova, came out today slamming the Wall Street Journal for their headline on the article that said the world number one who hits so hard she practices against men. So Maria Sherupova was not happy about this. Shared this on her Instagram story and said, “What is this headline? What is this article? You can do better WSJ.” And the journalist who wrote this, his name is Joshua Robertson, a European sports reporter, but obviously there’s definitely more people who have contributed on this article and all those things, but clearly the one thing we know is that a tennis great is not happy about this headline. So Casey, are you shocked to see this? Do you think this was an overreaction by Maria Sherova? What what are you thinking about this this tagline? I think it’s very on brand for Sheripova um for a number of reasons. Sherupova, it’s because she’s a big advocate for women’s space in in numerous sports. Um, she’s come out and kind of done press conferences across the board, but more importantly to be like she hits so hard she can compete against the men. This is a narrative we’ve tried to kind of like steer away from for a while. And for it to pop up in a tennis respect, I can understand her frustration a little bit further because you have so many male tennis players that literally tell media how tough it would be to compete against a Sherupova, a Madison Keys, a Coco Golf. And when they do their pairings, like you see how they do the social media announcements now, like I know it was a big deal that um Jack Draper, I think he got to pair off or he was in support of Emily Nero, a good friend of his, pairing off with like a top talent. And it’s because they know that like you’re powerful in certain minute moments and you’re precise in certain moments. And tennis is more of a mental game than anything else. A powerful serve is great, but if you have no control over that power, then you’re just a wild card that can’t get past the rounds. So to be annoyed about something like that, I can totally understand because there’s just so much more to tennis than like you got a powerful hit. You can match pace with the men. Like not every guy is a powerful hitter, right? You know. Yeah. No, that’s that’s so fair. And here’s the thing too, like it’s true. Yes. It’s like women train with men for a reason, right? It makes makes them better. You can look at what we talk about on Respect all the time, women’s college basketball, the top programs in women’s college basketball, even down to programs in America, they have men training with them, right? So, like it’s definitely a thing. But I think when you look at like the Wall Street Journal and how highly regarded it is, it’s like that’s the best you could come up with. Like if you’re a journalist, like where you been, dude? Like compare my numbers. Like show what that power number is in comparison to other powerful numbers. Don’t make it a point of emphasis of men versus women. Make it a point of emphasis of top power hitters versus top power hitters, right? And like where have like where have they been? Because this has been the discussion for all the time. Like if you ask any female athlete who competes at the highest level, she’s probably cross-trained or trained in some respect with guys. Like this is nothing new. So I think yeah, if that could have been a sub, you know, heading of the article, awesome. I didn’t even read the full article cuz I was like, well, we already know what you think it’s about. You know what I mean? Like maybe it could have been something a little more like get the hook. I mean, now we’re out here like telling Wall Street Journal what they should do. It’s not our own consulting firm, honestly. But basically, we’re on our way. We’re on our way. But basically, like, hey, here’s like three things you need to know that this number one player in the world does that, you know, helps our game. I just think it’s a very, it’s not intelligent. It’s like a very uncreative tagline, headline really. Yeah, it’s very lazy because honestly, if you just drag up a little bit more work and every approach to something in sports these days, I always look at it from a new fan perspective and a a dialedin fan perspective and how to merge the two. So like sitting here saying like she’s so good she can compete with guys. That’s so antiquated like show me other numbers it like not entertain. What’s the word I’m looking for? Educate me. Educate me while you highlight something that should be getting flowers. Wimbledon like during a time when people are logging on watching tennis, right? Like there aren’t I would say like it’s not always on the TV. It’s not the first thing you see when you turn on Sports Center, right? So when there are these big time matches, these grand slams, like let’s talk about it in the right way. So yeah, I was I was definitely confused. Had Maria Sherupova on my wall growing up as a kid and a big fat head. I actually didn’t know who she was for a long time. I just kind of funny story. My sister had a big fat head of some football players and I was like, “Hey, I want a fat head on my wall, too.” So my my dad was like, “All right, like I’ll get you Maria Sherupova.” And for some reason, I like didn’t connect the two. I just was like, “Oh, cool. Like tennis player on my wall.” And then I was at the grocery store one day, like years later, I saw her on a magazine. I’m like, “That woman looks familiar.” She was on the wall. It was fatthead. You know what? They always have killer style, though. So at least you maybe have like a stylistic icon. Casey’s outfit today. I really again leaned into the Wimbledon conversation. It is so cool. Well, another really awesome story at Wimbledon right now is Ben Shelton. And after his third round win, he called his elder sister Emma’s employer to give her more PTO as she’d be his lucky charm in Wimbledon, the employer was Morgan Stanley, and they gladly accepted. I think a lot of people would have been up in arms about this, but this is just so fun. This is why we love sports and getting to see cute things like this. But I feel like if you didn’t give her PTO for that, that would be wrong. I mean, what would you do as her employer? Like her brother was killing it. Um, calls you is like, “Hey, I need I need my lucky charm here. Like, what are you gonna do?” But like many sports, Morgan Stanley is quite involved from the sponsorship side. So I’m sure there’s a little bit of a soft spot to be like, “Hey, we totally get it and she probably works hard.” It’s got to be one of those things in your contract that’s like unseen situations or like PTO for things unknown, you know, what’s what’s going to come up. And I feel like that definitely counts. Like that has to count. And uh you know, it’s it’s only certain situations that this happens. So it’s not like that happens every day. Absolutely. And I think that call was very much um needed and on brand because right before we started the show I saw that Ben Shelton’s actually getting the tab to make it to the quarterfinals. So he is going to be in high representation for the Americans. But he’s been a fun guy to watch over the past couple of years. Just a ball of energy. Went to UF followed a number of his dad’s footsteps. So like he’s so ingrained with his family. You can tell his family is his heartbeat for this success that he is pressing upon for sure. And then of course, if you’re not paying attention to his numbers, his stats, his climb in tennis, then you got to be paying attention to how him and Trinity Rodman are like the it couple of tennis right now. If anyone saw the Wimbledon movie with um Kirstston Dunce, like just reinsert Ben Shelton and Trinity Rodman. It’s so cute. Hey, it’s awesome. There’s so many different ways that you can talk about sports and all the fun story lines through it. And I love the family support, too, because it is an individual sport, right? Unless you’re playing doubles. And so to be able to have that team and that family come around you, it’s important. So get that PTO if you’re a tennis player and you’re a family member cuz you got to be there to cheer them on.
