MIAMI -- The matches seem to come in waves on Terrific Tuesday, with all 16 remaining men's contenders and two women's quarterfinalists vying to improve on their positions. Here are five matches that caught our eye on the final day of sensory overload here on Biscayne Bay.
1. Play with fire, get burned:
Venus Williams was poised to make a great run here this week. She defeated quality opponents Samantha Stosur and Caroline Wozniacki in her two previous matches, and faced diminutive No. 12 seed Carla Suarez Navarro in a quarterfinal.
Williams ripped through the first set, 6-0. But as so often happens to a player who comes out on fire, Williams' level dropped. When it did, Suarez Navarro was right there to take advantage. She fought back to win it 0-6, 6-1, 7-5, aided by a surprising degree of support from the crowd given that this is Williams' home tournament.
The frustrating thing for Williams must be that this was the third successive match in which she built a big lead that she just couldn't sustain. She was also obliged to survive strong fight-backs from Stosur and Wozniacki. Williams contained them both, but Suarez Navarro hung in and finished Williams off with a tiebreak-avoiding, match-ending break in the final set.
"Well, the crowd is amazing here," Suarez Navarro said. "I feel good here in Miami. I want to feel also like this in my next match."
2. Life's a beach
The word around the media room is that should Kei Nishikori make the Miami Open final, they'll play the match on Court No. 2. Nishikori has been beating opponents savagely; he's lost a grand total of 10 games in three matches. But he has yet to see the inside of the stadium court.
Granted, Nishikori has had a favorable draw. His fourth-round opponent was No. 18 seed David Goffin. But Nishikori is firing on all cylinders. "I don't think it usually happens," he said of his form after his win over Goffin. "But everything has been going well -- my serve, my return, my strokes."
Nishikori, who lives across the state in Bradenton, enjoys going to the beach, but he's resisting the urge: "When you're playing, it's not easy to go out."
3. No gain from pain
It's one of the great ironies in tennis: Gael Monfils, a superb athlete and one of the most electrifying showmen in all of sports, can't stay healthy long enough to thrill crowds -- or get back close to that career-high ranking of No. 7 that he held in the spring of 2011. Monfils is now No. 19. Here at the Miami Open, he was healthy again, and he won a third-round clash with fellow countryman Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the Battle of the Chronically Injured Frenchmen.
The carefree times would not last through another match. Trailing No. 8 seed Tomas Berdych 6-3, 3-2, Monfils stretched for a forehand retrieve and crashed onto his right hip. He tried to play on, but the bruised hip was too tender. "I thought maybe I could go on but I couldn't put pressure on the right leg," he explained. Of his incessant injuries, he said: "It's frustrating but, yeah, it happens. I'm not worried. Hopefully with two days of recovery, I will be able to go back on the court."
4. Blame it on Miami
Andrea Petkovic knocked off an on-fire No. 14 Karolina Pliskova in the quarterfinals 6-4, 6-2, and seems to have found her game again.
Petko lost the first three matches she played this year, and that included a disappointing loss to Madison Brengle at the Australian Open. Then came the first round of World Group Fed Cup play, with Australia visiting Germany in Stuttgart. Petko won both singles matches in overtime (12-10 and 8-6 in the third over Stosur and Jarmila Gajdosova, respectively) and emerged the heroine of the tie. Immediately thereafter, she won at Antwerp and is now back among the elite at No. 10 -- and in the semis here.
Petkovic attributes her success to the funky atmosphere of Miami. "I am naturally a very uptight person when it comes to my job. I'm just very stiff, German," she said. "So like in my personal life, I'm total opposite. I love having fun and dancing and joking around and doing fun stuff. Miami kind of relaxes me. I don't know, maybe because it's kind of crazy and chaotic. These two opposites, they sort of mesh into a balance that's good for me."
5: Which Baby Fed was that?
No. 11 Grigor Dimitrov may hoover up most of the "next big thing" media coverage, but watch out for 21-year-old Dominic Thiem. The youngest player to finish in the top 50 at the end of his breakthrough 2014, Thiem has struggled this year. But Tuesday, he put up a quality win, surviving Frenchman Adrian Mannarino 7-5 in the third set.
Mannarino, who's 26, hit a career-high ranking of No. 32 on Monday. Thus far in 2015, he made his first ATP final of his career in Auckland, and just two weeks ago at Indian Wells he made the fourth round at an ATP Masters 1000 for the first time. He ousted No. 7 seed Stan Wawrinka here just a few days ago. Mannarino had a hot hand, but Thiem cooled it off.
Dimitrov is almost two-and-a-half years older than Thiem, who reached No. 36 in the rankings last fall before slipping back to his present No. 52. Like Dimitrov -- and Roger Federer -- Thiem hits a picture-perfect one-handed backhand. He gets Andy Murray next.