Mardy Fish may once serve in the role of U.S. Davis Cup savior when the United States takes on Colombia this weekend in Bogota.
The United States needs to defeat Colombia in this Play-off Round to stay in the elite 16-team Davis Cup World Group and be eligible to win the Davis Cup trophy in 2011. A loss would drop the United States into “zonal” competition where it will be ineligible to win the Cup until it emerges from a pool of second-rate tennis nations from North, Central and South America and again play in the Play-off Round and win. Only one other time in the history of the competition has the United States been relegated to zonal competition (1988).
The U.S. may have fallen out of the Davis Cup World Group in 2003 if it were not for the heroics of Fish, who is joined on the U.S. team in Colombia by John Isner, Sam Querrey and Ryan Harrison.
After the U.S. team, missing an injured Andy Roddick, lost to Croatia in Zagreb in the 2003 Davis Cup first round, it drew a difficult away match against the Slovak Republic in September’s Play-off Round. The tie was played on clay and U.S. Captain Patrick McEnroe had selected Roddick, James Blake and, for the first-time ever, the Bryan twins, Bob and Mike, to the U.S. squad. McEnroe asked Fish to travel with the team as a “fifth player” for practice and for use in an emergency. Roddick was the newly-minted US Open champion and on a roll, dominating the U.S. summer hard court season, entering the match having won his last 19 matches. Blake was struggling in practice during the lead-up while Fish was playing at a very high level. When it came time to nominating his team at the traditional Thursday draw ceremony, McEnroe replaced Blake with Fish as the No. 2 singles player behind Roddick.
Roddick christened the brand new Slovak Tennis Centre in Bratislava by taking the court against Dominik Hrbaty, the former French Open semifinalist. Playing with the retractable roof closed due to sun glare, Hrbarty played one of the greatest matches of his life, shocking Roddick 3-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 to give the Slovaks the surprising 1-0 lead.
Fish and Kucera next took the court with the future of the U.S. Davis Cup team almost squarely placed on the shoulders of Fish. Staring at a potential 0-2 deficit, thoughts of the United States being relegated for only the second time in its history appeared very real. Fish had only played three live Davis cup matches in his career – losing two – while Kucera boasted an impressive 25-9 Davis Cup singles record and with fresh thoughts of his recent 6-4, 7-6 (7), 6-4 victory over Fish in the second round of the US Open three weeks earlier.
Kucera routinely won the first set 6-4, after winning five of the first six games. At 5-5 in the second set, Kucera was able to get two looks at break points that would have given him the opportunity to serve for a two-sets-to-love lead. Fish responded with two resounding service winners to bring the score to deuce. As he then stepped to the line to deliver his first serve to Kucera, the Slovak National Tennis Centre suddenly went dark. All of the lights in arena went out as the court and stadium became shrouded in complete darkness.
With terrorism still fresh on the minds of Americans, the players were quickly whisked back into the locker room. Officials from the Slovak Tennis Association quickly determined that a blown circuit had created the black-out and after a delay of 28 minutes, play resumed. Fish still found himself in a precarious position of having of staving off Kucera after such a long wait that was bound to stiffen Fish’s body and play upon his nerves at such a crucial time in the match.
When play was called to continue, Fish calmly walked to baseline and served two consecutive service winners to hold his serve for the 6-5 lead. Kucera, seemingly more affected by the delay than Fish, was broken the next game, evening the match at one set a piece. Kucera quickly moved to a 5-3 advantage in the third set, seemingly taking control back in the match, before Fish again rallied to win nine straight games en route to an improbably 4-6, 7-5, 7-5, 6-1 victory which can be labeled about as clutch of a Davis Cup victory as one can have.
“The way Mardy played tells you why I picked him,” McEnroe said. “Down, 0-2, would not have been very pleasant.”
From there, the U.S. regained the momentum and after the Bryan twins won in their debut to make the score 2-1, Roddick was not going to be denied, bullying Kucera substitute Karol Beck to clinch the victory that vaulted the U.S. back into the Davis Cup World Group in 2004.