US Open 2026 pages
Sports · US Open 2026 · Women's Singles · Round of 128
Elise Mertens vs Kaitlin Quevedo — 6-4 6-4
 Elise Mertens✓ | 6 | 6 |
 Kaitlin Quevedo | 4 | 4 |
Final · Tuesday, September 1, 2026 · Round of 128
Result
Mertens said the night before exactly where she stood. "I don't arrive here fully fit, I have to admit," she told Tennisplaza, two days after losing the Monterrey final to Diane Parry. The match was closer than the scoreline: Quevedo hit 24 winners to the 23rd seed's 19 and lost 65 points to 72. What separated them was serve and chances. Mertens won 79% of her first-serve points and broke twice from seven openings; Quevedo earned one break point in an hour and 48 minutes and did not take it. Quevedo, 20 and ranked 107th, was making her US Open main-draw debut at the end of a season spent almost entirely on clay — 31 matches there against a handful on hard courts, and one competitive match since the start of August. Mertens, at her tenth US Open, reached a first Wimbledon quarter-final in July at 30, her fourth at a major and her first since 2020. Neither had played the other before. Her second round is Maria Timofeeva, whom she beat at Wimbledon this year.
Elise MertensRows the source hadn’t published are left off rather than guessed.
At this Stage
Round of 128 between the tour's most predictable excellence and its least-known newcomer: Mertens has made a career of being exactly as good as advertised, which for a debutante like Quevedo is either a clear roadmap or a closed door. This section of Rybakina's quarter stays navigable through the weekend — the winner's Round of 64 forms from a qualifier-heavy pocket. Sunday through Tuesday; $140,000 to the loser.
What we know now
Court: Court 13
Match length: 1:48
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.
Mertens. The 23rd seed is the tour's metronome — a 25–16 season, 229 career hard-court wins, a 2020 quarter-final here, and a game that has finished inside the top 40 for nearly a decade without ever donating a first-round shock. Quevedo at 20 is the draw's least-documented entrant: No. 107 with a 14–8 season built below tour level and a US Open debut in front of her. The Belgian's pattern against newcomers is unvarying and effective — depth, patience, and the quiet accumulation of every loose point until the scoreboard has drifted out of reach. The youngster's ceiling is unknown, which is the romantic case; the known quantities are all on one side. Mertens in two.
The case for Elise Mertens
78% to winMertens has spent a decade converting exactly this fixture: 229 hard-court wins, a quarter-final here, and the tour's most reliable percentage game. Debutantes beat top-25 seeds when the seed brings errors; Mertens does not bring errors.
The case for Kaitlin Quevedo
22% to winQuevedo arrives unscouted with a winning season and house money — the classic profile of a debutante who plays over her head for an afternoon. Mertens's pace-less consistency gives a free swinger time to work; at 20, fearlessness is a weapon that occasionally beats craft.
Both cases written 2026-08-28, 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: Elise Mertens to advance ✓ RIGHT
“A decade of not losing this exact match — craft, depth, and 229 hard-court wins against a debut.”
Locked 2026-08-28 06:40 UTC — rendered verbatim from the pick ledger; never a fresher, hedged version
Tale of the tape
Elise MertensKaitlin QuevedoPlayer vitals: US Open official player feed (usopen.org) and Tennis Abstract career match logs · as of 2026-08-28.
Career head-to-head: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-08-27.
Storylines
- Mertens's 2020 quarter-final anchors a decade of US Open consistency — she has been the tour's steadiest seed of her tier for years.
- Quevedo, 20, is making her US Open main-draw debut ranked No. 107 — among the least tour-tested entrants in the field.
- First meeting; the winner faces Timofeeva or a qualifier in the Round of 64.
Head to head
Never met — a decade of tour craft against a debut. The scouting asymmetry is total: Mertens has no film on Quevedo, and Quevedo has years of film on Mertens.
Source: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-08-27.
Court & schedule: Court 13, Tuesday 1 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 2026-09-01)
Weather: Sunday — the men's final, and the last match of the fortnight — was forecast at 78°F with showers and thunderstorms 95% likely, the wettest day of the two weeks and the one day that could not be pushed back. The rain came in the morning and stopped before the final, which Ashe played with its roof open. It cleared from there: 15% overnight, 15% Monday, then dry and sunny. (National Weather Service New York forecast, as of 2026-09-13)
Venue: USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, Flushing Meadows, New York — hard.