DELRAY BEACH, Fla. (AP) — Reilly Opelka’s winning streak in tiebreakers ended. His winning streak at the Delray Beach Open continued.
The second-seeded Opelka rode an unbeatable first serve into the Delray quarterfinals Thursday, beating Jack Sock 6-7 (6), 7-6 (4), 6-1. It was Opelka’s sixth consecutive victory at Delray, where he was the 2020 champion.
Opelka had 21 aces, just one double-fault, and won a staggering 53 of 56 points when he landed a first serve. He faced only one break point all day, which he saved.
“I competed really well,” Opelka said.
Opelka will face either seventh-seeded Adrian Mannarino or Brandon Nakashima in the quarterfinals.
Opelka had a pair of unforced errors to end the first set, as Sock won the opening tiebreaker — Opelka’s first loss in his last seven tiebreaks, after going 6-0 in those situations on his way to winning a tournament in Dallas two weeks ago.
But he knotted the match by winning a second-set breaker, then ran away in the third set.
“He was starting to fatigue a lot,” Opelka said.
Also moving into the quarterfinals with a win Thursday was John Millman, who defeated Marcus Giron 6-3, 7-6 (6). Millman has played five sets in his two matches at Delray; four have gone to tiebreakers.
Millman will meet either No. 3 seed Grigor Dimitrov or Mitchell Krueger in the quarterfinals.
All four quarterfinals are scheduled for Friday. Top-seeded Cameron Norrie meets Sebastian Korda in a rematch of a 2021 Delray semifinal, and No. 4 seed Tommy Paul will play Stefan Kozlov. Opelka and Millman will play night matches.
