For a No. 2 seed in the United States Open, an opening morning match at Arthur Ashe Stadium is usually a drama-free affair attended by the few fans who made it through the long security lines in time for the first match. On Monday, though, Simona Halep found her match a bit more adventurous than she planned in a 6-7 (2), 6-1, 6-2 victory over an unseeded American, Danielle Rose Collins.
Halep could have been excused for overlooking Collins, who was playing in her first Open as the beneficiary of a wild card, which she earned with a surprise victory in the N.C.A.A. tournament as a sophomore at the University of Virginia. Collins, the No. 32 seed, marched through the draw to meet Lynn Chi of California in the final, and her straight-sets victory made her the first women's singles champion from the University of Virginia.
None of that seemed to matter as Collins battled Halep into a first-set tiebreaker, where Halep seemed to lose her composure as well as the set. After dumping several errors into the net in the tiebreaker, Halep took several big swipes with her racket, barely missing smashing it into the court.
'It's really difficult to be second seeded here,' Halep said. 'It's my first time and my best ranking and the best moment of my life, but it is difficult. There is a lot of pressure on me. People say I should win and I can win. I want to take match by match and see how far I can go in this tournament.'
For Halep, a loss would have marred an otherwise spectacular year. She was following up her breakthrough in 2013, which hoisted her ranking to No. 11 and earned her the Women's Tennis Association's award for most improved player. She started with a run to the quarterfinals at the Australian Open, a trip to the final of the French Open, where she lost to Maria Sharapova, and a semifinal appearance at Wimbledon, where she lost to Eugenie Bouchard.
Halep turned her boiling point into positive motivation early in the second set, using her first break opportunity to swing the match in her favor. She pounced on a few short balls hit by Collins - the kind that unnerved Halep in the first set - and pounded them for clear winners. She needed only 33 minutes to win the second set, and followed by nearly as emphatic a victory in the third.
No. 6 seed Angelique Kerber also needed three sets and more than two hours to win her first-round match, beating Ksenia Pervak, 6-2, 3-6, 7-5.
In contrast, No. 4 seed Agnieszka Radwanska needed only 47 minutes to advance past Sharon Fichman of Canada, 6-1, 6-0. Radwanska is trying to reverse a career of misfortune at the Open, where she has never advanced past the fourth round in eight previous tournaments and had a string of three straight years when she was bounced as early as the second round.
There were a few more first-round matches Monday that were over just after people realized they had started. Kurumi Nara of Japan, the No. 31 seed, needed only 59 minutes to rout Aleksandra Wozniak of Canada, 6-2, 6-1. In similarly quick fashion, Belinda Bencic of Switzerland beat Yanina Wickmayer of Belgium, 6-3, 6-2.
Leonardo Mayer of Argentina was the first men's player to advance, helped by the second-set retirement of his opponent, Albert Montañés of Spain.
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