Milos Raonic

[BearcatSA]

Tonight, not before 10:00 PM EDT, in the Third Round at Indian Wells/"BNP Paribas Open" (Masters 1000), live on Sportsnet One, West & Pacific: Raonic vs. Federer!

My wife and I were in Indian Wells from the QFs on. I had my Shaw Direct satellite on Smart Record for the tennis on Sportsnet One and this day and match (Tuesday) was the only one that didn't get recorded for the entire tournament! So in the end, did it actually get broadcast on One or just get switched to the regional channels? I just find that so frustrating with Sportsnet's tennis coverage (and Shaw's inability to alter their programming) in that they jack their scheduling around on very short notice so trying to record something in advance can be very haphazard. So how did he play?

As for the rest of the tourney, it was a cold Saturday in the desert! Glad I had my winter camping garb in the stadium! Isner had a great run, coming back to beat Simon on Thursday night and then upsetting Djokovic in the semi but ran out of steam vs Federer, who handled the weather conditions better than Nadal on the delayed and cold Saturday. For the women, it was a battle of the scream queens like it was in the Aussie Open with Azarenka once again overpowering Sharapova. The Russian/American doesn't display any kind of craft or tactical nous apart just hammering the ball back and hoping for winners. No way she'll be the Belarusian/American any time soon.

[DJT]

#25 Raonic followed his dominant 6-3, 6-3 Third Round win over #13 Nicolas Almagro with an even bigger win today in the Quarterfinals of the Barcelona Open (500 series event): 6-4, 7-6(7-3) over #4 Andy Murray!

Murray is the highest-ranked player that any Canadian has defeated on the ATP tour (ie. not counting Nestor over #1 Stefan Edberg in the 1992 Davis Cup).

Raonic is the only non-Spaniard in the Semifinals, where he will take on #6 David Ferrer.

http://thestar.blogs.com/thespin/201...huge-leap.html

[Jeremy]

There you go Milos! Promised for great things...

[BearcatSA]

I really liked how he regrouped after blowing his chance to serve for the match. Good roll for Milos!

[DJT]

The run is over as he lost to Ferrer in straight sets today, but both sets went to tiebreakers.

[BearcatSA]

I believe 0 for 4 now vs Ferrer but I felt this match was significantly better than the previous 3 from last year.

[BearcatSA]

A long time since anyone has posted here. Raonic returns to where he was hurt last year at Wimbledon. If he wins and Popiscle wins against Querrey, it will be an All-Canada second round match. The wife's got the PVR queued up and ready to roll!

[mserson]

An incredible performance by Milos at the Olympics today.

[BearcatSA]

He battled hard, for sure.

Next up is Toronto, where it's quite possible that only one of the top 5 world players will be in attendance (Murray says he'll be flying to T.O. but says his appearance will depend on how his body feels...me thinks his body will say "no").

[BearcatSA]

Raonic is starting his U.S. Open journey vs Giraldo of Colombia.