"At the US Open was the first time in a really long time that I've had a really good result like that. So I was extremely emotional. Everything just kind of hit me at once. Now after seeing that video a few times of my press conference, I'm trying to hold it together a little bit better."
-- Mirjana Lucic-Baroni, after she upset French Open No. 3 seed Simona Halep for the second time in successive Grand Slam meetings.
Mirjana Lucic-Baroni could make a pretty good living in this game if she could only get Simona Halep in the first round at every tournament -- or so it would seem. Not only did the Romanian dynamo Halep, who was a French Open finalist in 2014, help Lucic-Baroni to a considerably heftier paycheck at majors twice now, she also was the one most responsible for rekindling what may be the most unusual career in tennis.
That upset of Halep at the US Open last August (where she had to qualify) marked Lucic-Baroni's return to the big time after an absence of nearly a decade and a half. Lucic-Baroni won the US Open girls' singles title at age 14. By 16 she'd won tournaments, had a Grand Slam doubles title and had been in a Wimbledon semifinal. Then her career collapsed, because of allegations of her father's abuse and other personal problems.
Yet Lucic-Baroni never gave up. That's why she found herself crying and apologizing to reporters at the US Open after she upset Halep last August: "I'm a little bit emotional now. Sorry. It's been really hard. Sorry. After so many years to be here again, it's incredible." A few weeks later she won the title at Montreal. She was 32 years old. It had been 16 years and four months since she last won a WTA title. It's a record that may never be broken.
On Wednesday at Roland Garros, Lucic-Baroni once again played with that once-magical combination of fierce aggression and assured consistency. Halep, meanwhile, looked as if her joints had rusted overnight. Her reactions were slow and she seemed unable to marshal her customary anticipation and counter-punching abilities. She looked like she was choking, but denied it afterward. That's OK, she's usually in denial about that.
Lucic-Baroni is the opposite. She entered Roland Garros coming off a very tough loss in Strasbourg, where she led Madison Keys by 6-4, 5-0 in the second round -- only to see Keys loosen up, swing away and win the match.
"I got a little bit tight," Lucic-Baroni said in Paris. "Nobody likes to admit it, but it happens."
Somehow (actually, with the help of "a few glasses of wine"), she put that episode behind her in time to knock out the woman many picked to win here.
"I really do love this game," Lucic-Baroni said. "Especially after last week when I must have said that night [after the Keys match] a thousand times, 'I hate tennis more than anything in life.' You know, it's a lot of emotions, for sure, up and down, but I really do love the game. So as long as I can, and as long as my body allows me to, I'm going to keep fighting and keep playing."