US Open 2026 pages
Sports · US Open 2026 · Women's Singles · Round of 64
Cristina Bucsa vs 
Himeno Sakatsume
Round of 64
Watch: ESPN · ESPN2 · ABC · ESPN app
My pick: Cristina Bucsa to advance · locked 2026-08-31 20:50 UTCPrediction
Bucsa is the higher-ranked player at No. 40 and has been further at this tournament than anyone else in this corner of the draw — fourth round a year ago — and she has just beaten the 28th seed, Sara Bejlek, 7-5 4-6 6-1. But she did it on Bejlek's 48 unforced errors rather than her own quality: nineteen winners in 2 hours 7 minutes, and seventeen break points to convert seven. Sakatsume is a qualifier ranked No. 144 playing her first US Open, and her 6-3 6-3 over Anhelina Kalinina in 1 hour 24 minutes was the cleaner match of the two — fourteen unforced errors, 74% of first-serve points won, four breaks from seven. Bucsa's 9–16 season is the number the ratings do not capture; Sakatsume is 14–9. Elo has this near 64–36 to Bucsa and the recent form does not agree. They have never met.
The case for Cristina Bucsa
64% to winBucsa is ranked 104 places higher, reached the fourth round here in 2025, and has just taken out a seed in three sets — an ugly win, but a win against the better player. She is 89–84 on hard courts to Sakatsume's 25–19, and a qualifier reaching a second-round match at a major for the first time has four matches in the legs already.
The case for Himeno Sakatsume
36% to winSakatsume has been the better player this month: 14–9 for the season against Bucsa's 9–16, through qualifying without alarm, and then 6-3 6-3 over Anhelina Kalinina with fourteen unforced errors and 74% of her first-serve points won. Bucsa needed seventeen break points to take seven and made 25 unforced errors against an opponent who made 48; against someone who does not gift points, that profile is a problem.
Both cases written 2026-08-31, 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.
Tale of the tape
Cristina BucsaHimeno SakatsumePlayer vitals: US Open official player feed (usopen.org) and Tennis Abstract career match logs · as of 2026-08-31.
Career head-to-head: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-08-31.
The briefing
Storylines
- Bucsa beat 28th seed Sara Bejlek 7-5 4-6 6-1, needing seventeen break points to convert seven.
- Bejlek's 48 unforced errors did most of the work; Bucsa hit nineteen winners in 2 hours 7 minutes.
- Sakatsume, a qualifier in her first US Open, beat Anhelina Kalinina 6-3 6-3 with fourteen unforced errors.
- Season records: Sakatsume 14–9, Bucsa 9–16.
- First meeting: they have never played.
Head to head
They have never met at tour level.
Source: Tennis Abstract career match logs (tour-level) · as of 2026-08-31.
Watch: Second-round coverage runs across ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC, with ESPN Deportes in Spanish — and every court streams in the ESPN app, which is where a match away from the two show courts will live. (ESPN press-room release and listings, as of 2026-08-27)
Court & schedule: Not yet assigned. The US Open posts each day's order of play the evening before, and this match has not reached the board yet. (Official US Open order-of-play release cadence, as of 2026-08-31)
Weather: Rain is the story of the week's opening, and it is forecast to get worse before it clears. Showers and thunderstorms are likely overnight — 72% under a low near 72°F — and Tuesday is the worst day on the board: near 81°F with storms likely through the day, 67%, and again after dark at 64%. Wednesday is the break in it, near 76°F on a 26% chance of showers, with a slight chance of storms returning overnight; Thursday is warm and unsettled again, near 84°F on 53%. Friday is the first clean day of the fortnight — near 82°F and mostly sunny after an early 15%. Ashe and Armstrong close their roofs and play on; everything else waits. (National Weather Service New York forecast, as of 2026-08-31)
Venue: USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, Flushing Meadows, New York — hard.
At this Stage
The Round of 64 halves the draw again: 32 women's matches across Wednesday and Thursday, every one of them between players who have already won here this week. The seeds who came through the opening round now meet opponents with form behind them rather than a ranking.
