Forty years ago, Arias was 15, holding his own against players in the top 100. He turned pro at 16 in 1980 and by 1983, he was No. 6 in the world. “I don’t think there’s any way today that a 15-year-old boy could beat a top 100 player,” he said.

Brady said she decided to go to college for a very simple reason: She was not good enough to play professionally.

“If you were to tell me that when I left, if I were to go to college in 2013 at U.C.L.A. and seven years from then I would be in the quarterfinals of the U.S. Open, I would probably laugh,” Brady said the other day, before she crushed Yulia Putintseva of Kazakhstan in that quarterfinal. “I wasn’t ready to play on the big stage. I definitely wasn’t ready to perform or compete with any of these other players.”

Brady has been something of a surprise since the beginning of her tennis life. Her father, Pat, worked in student services at Evert Academy, which John Evert founded with his sister, Chris, the 18-time Grand Slam singles champion, and their father, Jimmy. One night, John Evert’s secretary told him there was a young girl hitting on the courts who was not a student. “She said, ‘I don’t know who she is, but she is really good. You should go have a look,’” he recalled during an interview on Wednesday.

When Pat Brady saw Evert watching, he wandered over and told him the 10-year-old was his daughter. Evert enrolled her in the program the next day.

During her high school years, Brady’s talent was obvious. At tournaments, other players, coaches and parents all took notice of the 5-foot-11 girl with the big serve and whipping forehand. But Brady could not figure out how to win consistently.

Stella Sampras-Webster, the coach at U.C.L.A., said the first time she saw Brady play during a recruiting trip at Evert Academy, she could see Brady was gifted athletically and had all of the shots.

Source: New York Times

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