By Joe McDonald
Photo credit: Andrew Patron/Camerasport

NEW YORK—The last American man standing in the US Open made his serve stand up all the way until his very last service game.

It still wasn't enough to match Roger Federer's brilliance.

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The second-seeded Swiss broke John Isner in his final service game—the first time the towering American dropped serve in the tournament—scoring a 7-6 (0), 7-6 (6), 7-5 victory.

"If I was playing anyone else, the crowd I think would have been more behind me. But Roger, you know, he's a legend, living legend, still going," Isner said. "I expected the crowd to be into it on both sides. I don't think there was really a favorite. I mean, okay, yeah, if it was 100 percent on my side, that would be nice. But I understand that people pay a lot of money to see that guy play. So it's all good."

Maybe if he broke Federer at least one, but to no avail.

"Would have put me to even have felt better (not break him), to be quite honest," Federer said. "To win three tie breakers against John would have been probably a better feeling than breaking him. I don't know if it makes sense for you, but for me it does."

In all honesty, it would have taken a perfect match for Isner to move onto the quarterfinals. Even at the age of 34, six years removed from his last US Open final, the Swiss master is simply too good for the explosive American.

The maestro kept his poise on the humid night waiting to pounce during the tie breaks. In the first set, the tiebreak was all Federer, winning 7-0. It was the first time Isner was force-fed a bagel in a breaker.

"So there you go," Isner said. "Yeah, that was surprising. At 6-0 it's hopeless, you know. So, yeah, that was a lot on me. He had a lot to do with that, as well. Could have been much better.

"The second-set tiebreaker I played well, put myself in position to win that. I think I was serving at 5-3, so... Didn't get it done."

That's the story of this match. Isner just couldn't get it done.

He had his chances to break Federer and possibly upset him, but in the end the second seed was just too much for him.

"Seems to me that he stays the course, doesn't get too rattled," Isner said. "He had a lot of chances to break me. He was one for something. But he had some chances to kind of break the match open a little bit and didn't. But he stayed calm and composed, and he stuck with it. He always seems to do that. You know, he doesn't beat himself really. To beat him, you got to go out and do it."

Now Isner, who has opted out of the U.S. Davis Cup tie in Uzbekistan next weekend, will take some time and concentrate on making London. A good year will become better if he has a strong fall season.

"I do have a little bit of a break with Davis Cup not being on the schedule," he said. "But, yeah, I'm going to go for it, for sure. There's a lot of big tournaments ahead in the fall. Try to get my body right to make a serious run for that.

"I know it's tough, but it's also doable. It would be incredible for me to be able to make that. So I'm going to keep working hard, do the right things, go out there in Asia and Europe and try to get it done."