The Tears Were Flowing As Novak Djokovic Got Revenge On Carlos Alcaraz With Olympic Gold Medal

Matt Fitzgerald·
CULTURESPORTS
·
Novak Djokovic
NBC

Whatever your personal feelings are on Novak Djokovic, it’s hard to deny at this point that he’s edged out Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal as the GOAT of men’s tennis. The next likely challenger for that honor, Carlos Alcaraz, was Djokovic’s opponent during Sunday’s gold medal match at the Summer Olympics.

Alcaraz had beaten Djokovic in each of the last two Wimbledon finals, and already has three legs of the career Grand Slam at age 21. The textbook definition of a prodigy, whose path to his only missing major, the Australian Open, figures to get easier whenever the 1o-time champ Djokovic retires. Just their mere playing against each other today was the stuff of legend.

About the only accolade missing from Djokovic’s trophy case was the Olympic gold. After a couple tense, tightly contested sets against Alcaraz and two tiebreakers, he can add that to his resume.

And I gotta say, as somebody who hasn’t been the biggest personal fan of Djoker throughout his career, I was kind of blown away by his reaction to winning.

For as much of that as he’s done in his incredible career, this meant something more. Representing his home country of Serbia. The baggage of falling short in the Summer Olympics time and again. All to finally break through at 37 years old against somebody who denied him a potential eighth and ninth championship at Wimbledon. Once he blasted a forehand winner on match point, everything came pouring out of Djokovic as he celebrated his triumph.

The picture below might be the lasting image of Djokovic’s Olympic victory. It serves as a reminder that all-time great athletes are people, too, which can be very easy to lose sight of especially these days.

On the flip side, Alcaraz was understandably heartbroken, hoping to match his Spanish compatriot and doubles partner Rafael Nadal with a singles gold. Rafa topped the podium at the 2008 Beijing Summer Games, and partnered with Alcaraz to reach the doubles quarterfinals in Paris.

Alcaraz will have at least a couple more opportunities, maybe as many as four more, to get that gold. It’s just really cool to see how much the Olympics mean to the biggest stars in tennis. Not sure it’s necessarily reached “fifth major” status in men’s golf just yet, but it sure feels that way in this particular sport.

Congrats to Novak Djokovic. Retirement speculation will persist, but let’s just soak in the moment. Plus, if I were him, I wouldn’t want to follow Andy Murray’s epic bow-out anyway.

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