Never-say-die Lleyton Hewitt has staged yet another Houdini act to score an heroic five-set second-round victory at the US Open.
While fellow Australian Samantha Stosur kept her women’s title defence alive with a routine straight-sets victory earlier on Friday, Hewitt overcame intense heat, a big deficit and 35 aces from big-serving Gilles Muller to reach the third round.
The 31-year-old wildcard received a standing ovation to chants of “Hewitt, Hewitt, Hewitt” on Court 11 after prevailing 3-6 7-6 (7-5) 6-7 (5-7) 7-5 6-4 in four hours and 35 minutes.
Wife Bec, coach Tony Roche, Davis Cup captain Pat Rafter and hitting partners Peter Luczak and “Big Red” Chris Guccione were on the edge of their courtside seats throughout the tension-filled encounter.
The match was played under the extreme heat rules, with extra time allowed during the changeovers, when Hewitt and Muller often applied ice packs to their necks and arms in an effort to cool down.
At one stage in the match, Hewitt was staring down the barrel, trailing by a set, 5-3 and love-30 on serve.
All up, the 2001 champion had to fight off 14 break points and overcome 14 double-faults to survive.
The titanic win was Hewitt’s 31st five-set victory and set up a third-round clash on Sunday with Spanish fourth seed David Ferrer.
By contrast, Stosur did it easy, the world No.7 serving up a treat to reach the last 16 with a 7-6 (7-5) 6-2 disposal of American Varvara Lepchenko.
Apart from the opening game of the match, Stosur dropped just seven points on serve and raised her ace tally to a tournament-high 20 in the impressive win.
Stosur was delighted after setting up a mouth-watering fourth-round showdown on Sunday with giantkilling British teenager Laura Robson.
“Apart from that first service game, I felt like I served very well,” the seventh seed said.
“As the first set went on and then throughout the second set I held pretty comfortably throughout.
“As I was doing that, I would put a bit more pressure on her service games. That’s kind of how the match unfolded. That’s how I was able to get those run of games in the second set.”
Robson has Stosur on guard after continuing her career run with a 6-4 6-7 (5-7) 6-2 upset win over Chinese ninth seed Li Na.
Na, who claimed the Open lead-up title in Cincinnati, had been riding an eight-match winning streak just as Kim Clijsters had been on a 22-match unbeaten run at Flushing Meadows before falling victim to Robson the previous round.
“She’ll be full of confidence,” Stosur said. “I’ll have to be on top of my game.”
Stosur’s victory was the 28-year-old’s 14th from her past 15 matches in New York.