"She asked how bad it was going in the first set. And so I told her (CiCi) actually won the first set. She couldn't believe that," Gordon said. "We were just thankful that she didn't get double-bageled." After trailing 3-1 in the third set -- "kind of a bummer," Bellis would say later -- she came back to even things, and then broke the 25-year-old Cibulkova in the final game. When it ended, Bellis crouched at the baseline and pumped her fists, then ran over to the stands for congratulatory hugs.
"I didn't expect her to play so aggressive today. I thought she's kind of a player who's just putting the ball back and running around," Cibulkova said. "That didn't happen today. She was really aggressive on the court and that maybe surprised me in the first set."
Bellis was making her main-draw tour-level debut, having earned a wild-card invitation from the U.S. Tennis Association by winning the USTA Girls' 18s National Championship, the youngest to do since Lindsay Davenport also won it at 15 in 1991.
