Christopher Eubanks’ extraordinary run at the Atlanta Open came to an end Friday.
Facing the fourth-seeded Ryan Harrison, Eubanks fell in straight sets (6-1, 6-2).
“I think I played some pretty good tennis at times, but just not enough,” Eubanks said. “Not enough to compete, and it just makes me hungrier to get back to the drawing board, get stronger, get in better shape. So that I can come back and contend with guys round after round, opposed to doing it for a match or two.”
Eubanks, who attends Georgia Tech, made the main draw through qualifying and upset Taylor Fritz and Jared Donaldson to reach the quarterfinals. With all five top seeds remaining in the tournament, Eubanks was glad to just be competing with some of the top players in tennis in the late rounds.
“It kind of makes you a little excited, a little happy,” Eubanks said. “The biggest emotion is ready to get back to work just get better, get stronger to come back and do well again.”
With 10 double faults and just 48 percent of his service points won, Eubanks fell in a deep hole early that he was unable to get out of. Harrison allowed zero break points in the match.
“I definitely did not get off to a good start serving,” Eubanks said.” My game usually goes how my serve goes. So, if my serve goes well, if you look at the past couple matches if you look at my stats, I was serving really well. Today I was not serving nearly as well. I do not know what the stats were, but I can tell they were not that good. My game kind of goes with that.”
With the hometown crowd behind him, Eubanks said he really felt the pressure and anxiousness with the match.
“The compounded pressure from playing two really physical matches … not getting much sleep last night because I was so excited after winning the match, I was so anxious,” he said. “I did not get much sleep at all. I was really wired and ready to go.”
Eubanks could move up more than 100 spots in the world singles’ rankings after his performance in Atlanta. He’s currently ranked 461st.
