ATLANTA 2013: Isner Beats Anderson To Win 7th ATP Title

6'10" American John Isner won his 7th career ATP tour title by defeating 6'8" South African Kevin Anderson in a wild 6-7(3) 7-6(2) 7-6(2) final of the BB&T Open in Atlanta, the first stop on the 2013 US Open Series. It was the tallest final in ATP history and the first final since Milos Raonic won the 2012 Chennai Open over Janko Tipsarevic that a title was decided by a match with no service breaks. The 3-set match lasted just 5 minutes shy of 3 hours.

Isner saved 11 break points and had 24 aces, compared to 21 aces (and only one break point on his serve) for Anderson. Two of the breakpoints that Isner saved were also match points at 5-6 in the 3rd set, and he also fought his way out of 0-40 in his first service game at 0-1 in the deciding set as well.

Isner improves to 7-7 in career finals (and a tour leading 26-7 for the year in tiebreaks) while Anderson falls to 2-4. The American will return to the Top 20 after today's win in Atlanta when the new rankings come out tomorrow. Isner had played tennis in college for the nearby University of Georgia Bulldogs and this was the third time in four years he was playing in the final of what he considers his hometown tournament (losing to fellow American Mardy Fish in 2011 and 2010). Isner's win puts him in the lead of the US Open Series on the men's side.

In other ATP news, Fabio Fognini's amazing win streak on clay came to an end at 13 when he lost in the finals of the Croatia Open in Umag to Tommy Robredo 6-0 6-3. It was the pulchritudinous Italian's 3rd consecutive final in as many weeks, but the Spanish veteran used his experience to win his 12th career title (11 of which have been on clay).