Serena Williams got good news Thursday.
The unseeded legend from Compton, Calif., will get a reprieve in the first round of the U.S. Open next week when she faces 80th-ranked Danka Kovinic.
Williams will play the first match of her last tournament either Monday night or Tuesday night after the USTA decides whether to extend the suspense. Kovinic, 27, is as favorable a foe as Williams could have hoped for. The six-time Open champ could have drawn anyone because of her 407 ranking.
Kovinic, 27, is from Montenegro and is known more for doubles. Her style also could suit Williams because she’s a big hitter who goes for a lot and makes her share of mistakes. Williams is more prone to trouble from a consistent, soft-ballling baseliner.
If Williams wins her first match, she’ll play the winner of the first-round match between Jaqueline Adina Cristian and Anett Kontaveit, the second-seed who played the best tennis of her career last fall and winter. But the Estonian, in a mini-slump, is beatable.
There could be a spectacular marquee match if Williams gets to the third round, where she could face the 2021 Open finalist and fan favorite, 14th seed Leylah Fernandez of Canada.
Since her split with coach Patrick Mouratoglou, Williams has enlisted Rennae Stubbs to coach her for the Open. Stubbs said on ESPN after the draw, “It’s really about her anxiety — how she is mentally.”
No doubt Williams has received a favorable quarter of the draw, but not enough to swing the betting oddsmakers into believing she will make it to the second week.
Barring a Flushing miracle, Williams will fall short of tying Margaret Court’s record of 24 Grand Slam titles. Williams has been stuck on 23 since 2017.
The 40-year-old icon missed a year with injuries before returning to lose in the first round at Wimbledon in July. Her Open tune-ups weren’t too solid either: a second-round ouster in Toronto and a first-round defeat in Cincinnati versus reigning U.S. Open champion Emma Raducanu after she received an awful draw.
“She’s not playing that badly,” ESPN analyst Chris Evert said before the Open draw. “I thought that last tournament she looked better than the tournament before. She’s gradually getting better. And supposedly she’s moving better now. Every week that she has to train is an added bonus because she can get up to that 80 percent level pretty quickly. I say don’t underestimate her. I still think she was serving well in the last tournament. She’s hitting the ball hard, she’s going after second-serve returns.
“She just needs to get that little ball tolerance up another two shots. And I think she could have a decent couple of matches. I think she’s getting better and better as time — but the problem is the field. The problem is everybody else is getting better, too.”
Before the draw, Evert said he believed it would be a long shot for Williams to make it to the second week, when the Round of 16 commences. Evert changed her tune, however, after the pairings were announced.
Meanwhile, Coco Gauff, the 18-year-old from Delray Beach, Fla. who some feel could be the next Serena, has a chance to shake things up. Gauff, however, is in the same quarter as Simone Halep, Madison Keys and surging Caroline Garcia.
Gauff made the French Open finals last spring, but has never gotten past the third round in Flushing.