'The crowd definitely helped' Cincinnati native Peyton Stearns falls in Cincinnati Open
MASON, OH – Facing an opportunity to upset a seeded player in her hometown, Cincinnati native Peyton Stearns lost some key points and needed some medical treatment. Her singles tournament is over but she has doubles to play in her home stadium.
Stearns lost in three sets to No. 28 seed Anna Kalinskaya Aug. 9 in the round of 64 in the Women’s Tennis Association Cincinnati Open at the Lindner Family Tennis Center. Kalinskaya won 7-6 (4), 4-6, 6-1 in a match that took 2 hours, 30 minutes.
Kalinskaya will next play No. 5 seed Amanda Anisimova, the 2025 Wimbledon runner-up, in the round of 32.
Stearns had picked up her first main-draw win in Mason Aug. 7. Stearns’s tournament is not done. She will play in the doubles tournament with Marketa Vondrousova, who lost to World No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka Aug. 9 on Center Court. They will play at approximately 2:30 p.m. Aug. 10.
“Usually, when the match goes like that, you come back harder the next day,” Stearns said. “So I'm excited to get back out there tomorrow and get another win under my belt, hopefully.”
The first two sets could have gone either way.
In the first set, Stearns led 5-2 but couldn’t close the deal. She trailed 4-0 in the tiebreak and lost 7-4.
“In the first set when I didn't close the set point, the nerves kind of kicked in, and I kind of stopped doing what I was doing to get to that point,” Stearns said. “And Anna, she’s a good enough player to where if I don't continue going after my shots and playing the right way, she's going to trample me.”
In the second set, Stearns was trailing 2-1 on serve. She won a long game with Kalinskaya to hold serve and knot the set, 2-2.
Kalinskaya had major trouble with her execution in the next game, starting with two double faults, then sending groundstrokes long on the next two points to give Stearns an easy break at love, and Stearns led 3-2.
Still leading 5-4 and up a break, Stearns won a long game to claim the set, 6-4. She lost three set points and saved two break points against her. Stearns unleashed two straight aces over 100 miles per hour, then after the sixth deuce, she won the set on a Kalinskaya error.
Stearns had a large crowd of local fans cheering her on through every point.
“Yeah, I think the crowd definitely helped, staying with me the whole time, being super encouraging, so that helped me kind of claw my way back into the match,” Stearns said.
In the third set, leading, 2-1, Kalinskaya broke Stearns’ serve after the Cincinnati native saved two break points, and led 4-1 after holding her own serve.
Stearns took an injury timeout in the changeover for treatment on her right shoulder but said she’ll be fine.
“Just a little bit of tightness,” she said. “Last year, I had a lot of inflammation in the rotator cuff and the bicep, some tendinitis in there. It’s a long season, so those kind of things come and go. Just trying to stay on top of that, so it doesn't become a massive issue where I have to take a week off or something.”
Stearns did better when she got her first serve in, but couldn’t take full advantage of her opponent’s second serves, as Kalinskaya's powerful groundstrokes were a challenge all night.
Stearns is ranked 53rd in the world and will eventually turn her attention to the U.S. Open, which begins Aug. 24.
The combatants had split their previous two meetings. Kalinskaya won in China in 2024, and Stearns won in Rome this summer, 6-2, 6-3.
Kalinskaya reached the final at the DC Open in Washington July 27, losing to Leylah Fernandez.
Kalinskaya improved her record in Mason to 3-3 in the main draw. She makes her third appearance in the round of 32.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Cincinnati native Peyton Stearns falls in three sets in round of 64.
