Ryan Harrison Suffers Five-Set Heartbreak at US Open

Unable to convert on three match points in a fifth-set tiebreak, 18-year-old Ryan Harrison of Shreveport, La. was defeated by Sergiy Stakhovsky in a four-hour, 13-minute contest that survived two rain delays. The rising American star's U.S. Open dreams were dashed when the Ukrainian won five points in a row during the breaker to seal the match 6-3, 5-7, 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (6).

Experience proved to be a vital factor in the closing stages of the match as Harrison seemed to tighten up as Stakhovsky composed himself. Stakhovsky is a four-time ATP Tour winner and came into the U.S. Open winning the tour's last event in New Haven. It was only Harrison's second appearance in a singles Grand Slam.

Harrison, who inched his way back into the match with vicious groundstrokes, was often overly aggressive and committed 73 unforced errors as a result. His 63 winners gave him a chance to win the match, but late-match errors proved too costly. Harrison also struggled with his second serve late in the match, finishing with only a 36 percent winning clip on second-serve points.

After Harrison lost serve at the beginning of the fifth set, Stakhovsky took a 2-0 lead, before Harrison was finally able to break back on a fierce backhand winner to level the final set at 3-3. Both players then held serve to send the match into a deciding fifth-set tiebreaker.

Harrison went down 1-3 early in the tiebreaker, before rallying off five points in a row to give him three match points at 6-3. But Stakhovsky countered with three straight points of his own to tie the breaker at 6-6 and Harrison then handed him his first match point of the contest with a costly double fault. The 24-year-old Ukrainian only needed one as he converted on a strong first serve and a smashing volley at the net that ousted Harrison and moved Stakhovsky into the third round.

The 220th-ranked qualifier stunned 15th-seeded Ivan Ljubicic in the first round on Wednesday for his first Grand Slam singles victory. Harrison became the first American teenager to oust a top-20 seed in a major tournament since Andy Roddick in 2001.

Harrison was introspective about his tournament run, "I mean, it was a great experience. I mean, the whole last week and a half almost two weeks now has been incredible for me. I mean, I've always believed in myself and I've always believed that I could come in here and compete at this level," Harrison said in his post-match press conference. "But to go out there and actually execute and to win some of the matches I did, you know, I'm extremely happy about and extremely proud of."

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Harrison made his major debut at this year's Australian Open, where he lost to Janko Tipsarevic in straight sets. He lost in the USTA's eight-man playoff qualifying event for a wild-card invitation to the U.S. Open, but paved his own way to Flushing Meadows by winning three straight qualifying matches prior to the event's main draw.

Although Harrison has burst on to the major scene, he has been one of America's young tennis hopes for a couple of years now. At 15 years, 11 months, Harrison defeated Pablo Cuevas in an ATP event in Houston to become the third-youngest player since 1990 to win a tour-level match.

Harrison leaves Flushing Meadows heartbroken, but the 18-year-old's solid all-around game should make the American a mainstay on the ATP circuit in years to come.