Ben Shelton beat Frances Tiafoe 4-6 6-3 6-3 7-5 in the US Open semi-final on Friday to reach his first Grand Slam singles final and set up a Sunday meeting with Alexander Zverev. The match lasted three hours and 17 minutes, and Shelton finished it with the kind of late surge that has carried him deeper than he has ever gone before.
The result turned the search around Shelton into something bigger than one victory. He became the first black American male player to reach the US Open singles final since Arthur Ashe in 1972, and he is now trying to end a 23-year wait for an American male champion at the tournament, last won by Andy Roddick in 2003. For a player who had lost his previous two major semi-finals, this was the breakthrough that changed the shape of his season.
Shelton said his parents had sacrificed a lot for him to stand in this position, and he dedicated the run to his late grandmother, saying his father lost his own mother earlier this year and that she was the reason he was able to play tennis. It was a personal finish to a night that had already given the crowd a home hopeful and a final that now belongs fully to the US Open.
There is still a hard edge to the assignment. Shelton has lost all five previous meetings with Zverev, who beat Karen Khachanov 6-3 7-6 (9-7) 7-6 (8-6) to reach a third Grand Slam final in a row. That history does not decide Sunday, but it does explain why Shelton’s arrival in the final comes with a test that has already beaten him five times.
He has already done the part that once looked out of reach. Now Shelton has one match to turn a breakthrough into a title, against an opponent who has had his number every time they have met.
