And he did. Sam Querrey was ousted by Novak Djokovic at the Monte Carlo Masters 6-4, 6-0 in the quarters, but boy, did Querrey give the American tennis fans something to bank their hope with.

I was following the live scoring on the internet through the first set and Querrey did a remarkable job in fighting back to save his service games. He won his first service game pretty handily but his next two, he was in identical 15-40 holes but managed to win four consecutive points in each game to hold serve. That’s ballsy against someone like Djokovic.

I think I’ll graciously ignore the second set for Querrey’s sake.

Roger Federer overcame David Nalbandian after dropping his first set 7-5 to his “arch rival.” According to the Monte Carlo website, that’s what Nalbandian is to Federer.

I’m not sure that’s the case, but I am sure that the photo of Fed on the front page of the tournament site is awesome! Go check it out at Monte Carlo Masters Series. That’s pure emotion on Roger’s face, and it makes me happy.

Post from: EveryJoe

Monte Carlo: All Top Four Seeds Advance

Querrey got soundly beat in the first set 6-2 by Gasquet. Querrey showed his tenacity and mental strength by winning the final two sets 6-4, 6-3. In fact, Querrey broke Gasquet to go up 5-3 in the third and then closed out the match with a strong service game. Actually the last two games of the third set were all Sam Querrey: he won both at 40-15.

Image details: Sony Ericsson Open Day 3 served by picapp.com

This 20-year-old has officially impressed me. Now how will he do in the quarters against Novak Djokovic?

Post from: EveryJoe

Monte Carlo: Querrey Overcomes Gasquet

Instead, I want to talk about Sam Querrey. I mentioned him earlier this week, and Tennis.com did an interview with Querrey. Actually “interview” is a bit of an understatement. It’s basically everything-Sam-on-a-webpage.

I didn’t know much about Querrey before I found his life for me to read on Tennis.com. Like he was planning to go to USC before he decided to turn pro a year and a half ago. All his friends are athletes (I know, I’m absolutely shocked.), he’s sponsored by Adidas (if I had ever had the opportunity to watch him play, I probably could have figured that one out on my own) and he wants to get more fired up during his matches instead of being so laidback.

Now I feel like if I met Querrey on the street, we could talk about that one time, way back in the day, when he used to play T-ball in the back yard.

Post from: EveryJoe

Sam Querrey: In-depth

Andy Murray and Mario Ancic persevered in the first round as well, but the Cinderella story (if you can have one of those in the first round) was Sam Querrey of the United States.

Querrey upset Carlos Moya 6-3, 1-6, 6-3 to move on. Woo, the lone American hope!

But whoever is writing for the Associated Press needs some help. One of the points made about Querrey’s upset of Moya was that Moya had won Monte Carlo and the French Open before…in 1998.

I’m not discounting Moya’s accomplishments but this is 2008, a decade later. Just saying, ya know?

Post from: EveryJoe

Querrey Upsets Moya at Monte Carlo Masters