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Sports · US Open 2026 · Men's Singles · Round of 16
Carlos Alcaraz vs Tommy Paul — 6-4 6-3 6-4
 Carlos Alcaraz✓ | 6 | 6 | 6 |
 Tommy Paul | 4 | 3 | 4 |
Final · Sunday, September 6, 2026 · Round of 16
Result
Alcaraz had not played a singles match since 14 April, when he took a medical timeout for his wrist in Barcelona and withdrew the next day; he missed Madrid, Rome, Roland Garros, Queen's and Wimbledon, and came back to defend this title after four and a half months out. Nothing here suggested it. Neither man earned a break point in the first nine games; Alcaraz broke at 5-4 to take the set and never trailed after it. He broke for 2-0 in the second, was broken straight back — the only service game he lost all afternoon — broke again immediately, then wasted six break points in one game at 4-1 and had to serve the set out himself. The third turned on a 20-stroke rally, the longest of the match, that ended with a forced forehand-volley error. Serving for it at 5-4 he went 15-40 and saved both. He won 99 points to 74 and 23 of 29 at the net, and has now won 18 consecutive Grand Slam matches. The only trace of the layoff was one Paul had spotted: "I saw his first-serve speed maybe was dropped a little bit from before he took time off, but I thought he made up with it with his first ball after his serve."
Carlos AlcarazRows the source hadn’t published are left off rather than guessed.
At this Stage
The Round of 16 is the fourth round, and the point at which a Grand Slam stops being a draw and becomes a tournament you can hold in your head: eight matches, played across Sunday and Monday, and the eight who come through are the quarter-finalists. Everyone still here has won three matches on these courts, so the seedings have stopped being a guide and the form of the fortnight has taken over.
Round of 32
Round of 16
What we know now
Court: Arthur Ashe Stadium
Match length: 2:21
Watch: ESPN · ESPN2 · ABC · ESPN app
What I said beforehand
The preview, frozen before the first serve. Clearly dated, never rewritten — that's the deal that makes the pick worth anything.
Alcaraz leads this 6-2 and has won the last five, including the Australian Open fourth round in January, 7-6(6) 6-4 7-5 — the same round, the same year, and close enough that Paul will not think it is out of reach. Both of Paul's wins came on hard courts in 2022 and 2023, which is the honest shape of the head-to-head: it used to be competitive and it is not any more. The Elo gap is 201 points on hard, about three-to-one. What makes this less lopsided than the numbers is the state of both men. Alcaraz is playing his first tournament since April after a wrist injury that cost him Roland-Garros and Wimbledon, and he has not been convincing here — he broke and was broken straight back in the first game of each of the first two sets against Yibing Wu, made thirty-three unforced errors and needed fifteen break points to convert seven. He is winning because his floor is a Grand Slam winner's floor, on a seventeen-match Slam streak that includes the title here and the Australian Open. Paul has the opposite problem: he played three hours and thirteen minutes on Friday to come back from two sets to one down against Alexander Bublik, which is a lot of tennis to carry into a Sunday, and Alcaraz said afterwards he hoped Paul would be tired. But Paul also served one double fault in five sets and broke six times from eight chances, and he is 38-17 on the season. Alcaraz, and probably in four.
The case for Carlos Alcaraz
78% to winAlcaraz has won five in a row against Paul, is on a seventeen-match Grand Slam winning streak, and is the defending champion. His hard-court Elo is 201 points higher, about a three-in-four proposition, and his career hard-court record of 166-46 is a winning percentage nobody left in this half approaches. He has seven majors at 23. He won their most recent meeting in this exact round at the Australian Open in straight sets. And Paul arrives having spent three hours and thirteen minutes on court on Friday, two days before this, in a fifth set — a physical debt that Alcaraz, who has dropped one set all week, does not have.
The case for Tommy Paul
22% to winPaul has beaten Alcaraz twice, both on hard courts, and took a set off him as recently as this January in the Australian Open fourth round — a match in which two of the three sets were decided by a tiebreak or a single break. He is 38-17 for the season, his career hard-court record is 194-115, and he has just won a five-set match by breaking six times from eight chances with a single double fault across three hours and thirteen minutes. Alcaraz is three matches into his first tournament in five months and has looked it: thirty-three unforced errors against a player ranked 113th, and a break surrendered immediately in each of the first two sets.
Both cases written 2026-09-05, before the first ball — frozen into the record exactly as written, whatever the result. The percentages are mine — opinions with a percent sign on. They add to 100 because tennis has no draw to hide the rounding in.
My locked pick: Carlos Alcaraz to advance ✓ RIGHT
“201 points of hard-court Elo clear (≈76%), 6-2 up with five straight, and a seventeen-match Grand Slam streak; shaded up two points for Paul's three-hour-thirteen fifth-setter two days earlier, and not shaded down for Alcaraz's untidy third round because his floor has been winning anyway.”
Locked 2026-09-05 01:40 UTC — rendered verbatim from the pick ledger; never a fresher, hedged version
Tale of the tape
Carlos AlcarazTommy PaulPlayer vitals: US Open official player feed (usopen.org) and Tennis Abstract career match logs · as of 2026-09-05.
Career head-to-head: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-09-04.
Storylines
- Alcaraz leads 6-2 and has won the last five, most recently the Australian Open fourth round in January, 7-6(6) 6-4 7-5.
- Both of Paul's wins came on hard courts, in 2022 and 2023.
- Alcaraz is on a seventeen-match Grand Slam winning streak — the title here last year and the Australian Open in February — in his first tournament since April after a wrist injury.
- Paul came back from two sets to one down and beat Alexander Bublik in three hours thirteen minutes on Friday, reversing last year's third round.
- Alcaraz needed fifteen break points to convert seven against the 113th-ranked Yibing Wu, and made thirty-three unforced errors.
Head to head
Eight meetings, Alcaraz leading 6-2. Paul won on hard courts in 2022 and 2023; Alcaraz has taken the five since, the last of them the Australian Open fourth round in January, 7-6(6) 6-4 7-5.
Source: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-09-04.
Court & schedule: Arthur Ashe Stadium, Sunday 6 September. The US Open posts each day's order of play the evening before; this one is on the board. (Official US Open order of play, as of 2026-09-05)
Weather: Sunday — the men's final, and the last match of the fortnight — is 78°F with showers and thunderstorms 95% likely, the wettest day of the two weeks and the one day that cannot be pushed back. Ashe closes its roof and plays on. It clears overnight: 20% Sunday night, 20% Monday, then dry and sunny from Tuesday. (National Weather Service New York forecast, as of 2026-09-13)
Venue: USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, Flushing Meadows, New York — hard.