Carlos Alcaraz reaches third straight Wimbledon final, joins Federer, Nadal and Djokovic on exclusive list

Karen Khachanov made a winning start to his Wimbledon campaign on Monday, defeating Mackenzie McDonald in the first round of the grass-court major, 7-5, 6-4, 6-4.

And his victory over the American was a special one: it was the milestone 300th tour-level win of his career.

The 29-year-old is just the sixth man born in 1996 or later to hit that number. He’s now 300-216 in his career.

MOST CAREER WINS, MEN BORN IN 1996 OR LATER (tour-level):

498: Alexander Zverev [born in 1997]
402: Daniil Medvedev [born in 1996]
364: Stefanos Tsitsipas [born in 1998]
354: Andrey Rublev [born in 1997]
305: Taylor Fritz [born in 1997]
300: Karen Khachanov [born in 1996]

The next player to join the list will likely be one of Casper Ruud (born in 1998), Jannik Sinner (born in 2001) or Alex de Minaur (born in 1999), who have 283, 282 and 276 career wins as of now.

Carlos Alcaraz, born in 2003, isn’t too far behind with 252.

Khachanov improved to 6-0 in his career against McDonald.

Advertising

Khachanov had won all five of his previous meetings against McDonald, including two victories on grass, at Wimbledon in 2021 and in ’s-Hertogenbosch just a few weeks ago, and he kept that perfect run against the American going with a straight-set win on Monday.

There was a little hiccup closing the match out—originally up two sets and a double break at 4-1 in the third set, Khachanov got broken right back for 4-2 and McDonald held to close to 4-3—but then the two held from there until it was over.

The former No. 8 finished the match with 38 winners to 29 unforced errors, with all of that surplus coming from his serve, which produced 11 aces to just one double fault.

Awaiting him in the second round will be one of two qualifiers, Japan’s Shintaro Mochizuki or Italy’s Giulio Zeppieri, whose first-round match was suspended due to darkness after the players split the first four sets. The fifth set will be played on Tuesday.

Khachanov’s best career result at Wimbledon was reaching the quarterfinals in 2021, falling to Canada’s Denis Shapovalov.

Advertising