This time of year when you hear the name Brady and think of winning, naturally Tom of the New England Patriots comes to mind.
However down in Melbourne, a 21 year-old Brady named Jennifer is doing some winning of her own.
OZ Open qualifier Jennifer Brady, playing in her first Grand Slam beat No. 14 Elena Vesnina, 7-6 (4) 6-2, to make it into the fourth round.
“It feels amazing,” she said “I mean, you know, coming here, being in the qualifying, you know, I didn’t expect to, you know, make it all the way until second week.
“One of my goals, actually, was, you know, in the next couple years to be playing in the second week of a Grand Slam. I sat down and had that discussion with my coaches and, you know, the rest of my team — when was it? A couple months ago.”
Mission accomplished. Maybe she should shoot higher next time. Already Brady extended her room until Wednesday, but she bought a one-way ticket from California, so she’s good on the flight.
The funny thing is this amazing accomplishment is being done rather anonymously down in Melbourne. Since young Americans don’t have the same draw in Australia as they do in Flushing Meadows, this match was pushed out to one of the outside courts, while bigger names played on the stadium courts.
In fact, while Brady was winning on Show Court No. 2, John and Patrick McEnroe were playing an XO in one of the stadiums.
But that’s neither here nor there from the UCLA product, who went pro after her sophomore year, because she is making some real noise right now.
“I’d say I have been serving pretty well, so I’m able to hold my serve and eventually, you know, have the opportunity to break serve,” Brady said. “And, you know, just having an aggressive game style, you know, having a presence on court.”
That she has. Maybe she learned that presence from Chris Everett as she attended her academy in Florida as a kid after moving to the Sunshine State from Pennsylvania. She jokes that she’s is “tight” with Everett, but the relationship now is more from “tweeting and stuff.”
Now she has a chance to make the quarterfinals with a match later on with Brady’s next match against unseeded Mirjana Lucic-Baroni.
“I know she’s been playing pretty well,” Brady said. “She hits a pretty big ball. I think I’ll just go out and have fun and enjoy it. See what happens.”
With that loose attitude anything is possible for this young woman. Maybe with a few more wins under her belt, she will come into Flushing Meadows in August and when someone mentions the name Brady, they will think Jennifer.
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