The pint-sized 17-year-old from Marietta, Ga., was always the aggressor against Maria Sharapova. Oudin might have occasionally sent a serve 10 feet long or wafted a forehand to the backstop but Oudin never lost her nerve or her way en route to the fourth round of the U.S. Open.
Oudin, who upset fourth-seeded Elena Dementieva in the third round, knocked out 29th-ranked Maria Sharapova, 3-6, 6-4, 7-5.
Sharapova was once a No. 1-ranked player until the 22-year-old Russian had to undergo shoulder surgery last October. And late in the third set today, Sharapova had to call for the trainer, who spent nearly eight minutes working on Sharapova's right arm.
So far this summer Oudin has beaten two former No. 1 players, Jelena Jankovic at Wimbledon and Sharapova plus her upset of Dementieva, who had come here full of momentum after having won the Olympus U.S. Open Summer series.
And none of that has intimidated Oudin from playing her attacking style and always moving forward.
She also doesn't hide her emotions.
Many winning shots are punctuated with loud shouts, and after her win today she was unabashedly weeping. She isn't embarrassed to have a 15-year-old boyfriend or to say how much she wants to win tennis matches.
"It's all I want to do," she said.
Next up will be 13th-seeded Nadia Petrova, who beat Zheng Jie of China, 6-4, 6-1.
Oudin's winning point was typically all-out. After she and Sharapova had avoided holding serve for six consecutive games, Oudin stood poised to serve for the match. The second point was a double fault that made the score 15-15. But that was the last point Oudin lost.
Two deep Oudin forehands forced Sharapova into a netted forehand; a similar series of ground strokes made the score 40-15. As the crowd roared and the umpire asked for quiet, Oudin stepped off the service line, then she bounced the ball once, twice, then raised her arm and served.
For most of the third set Oudin had been registering in the 90s on the speed gun. This serve hit 101 miles an hour. Sharapova pushed the ball back where it landed short and sat there waiting for Oudin to pound out a winner. Oudin did just that.
Earlier in the day, Roger Federer lost a set to Lleyton Hewitt, and while the five-time defending champion was committing 42 unforced errors midway through the third set, while he was netting casual volleys and framing nonchalant forehands it seemed as if a major upset could be happening.
Except this is Federer, with his record-breaking 15 major championships and a diabolical way of crushing an opponent's tiny moment of optimism with the hiss of a 125-mph serve deep into the corner or a snappy backhand up the line.
So after Hewitt won the first set of this U.S. Open third-round match today and gave the Arthur Ashe Stadium a jolt with his screaming "Come on," Federer just shrugged, toweled off and went about his business, which was to win 4-6, 6-3, 7-5, 6-4.
"Roger's so good at dictating play," Hewitt said, "of playing on his terms so you're just trying to hang in on his service games. I can't really play the style of tennis I want to play out there against him."
Hewitt, 28, had won here in 2001, but his game has been in steady decline over the past three years, as he struggled with a hip injury that caused him to miss last year's tournament, while in 2007 he had his worst result in New York when he lost in the second round.
For the duration of the first set, though, Hewitt was able to keep Federer a little off-balance by keeping his service returns deep.
Federer will meet either 21st-seeded James Blake or 14th-seeded Tommy Robredo in the fourth round. Blake and Robredo play tonight's final match on Ashe Stadium.
