U.S. Open final is Shelton’s time to deliver great New York story

So now Ben Shelton, at 23, still with so much ahead of him in tennis, will try to become the first American man to win our national championship in tennis in 23 years. The left-handed kid, born in Atlanta, son of the former player who now coaches him, will try to do that in a stadium named after Arthur Ashe, against the No. 1 seed, Alexander Zverev, himself playing in his third Grand Slam final this year.

That is the game for Shelton, and the moment. It was Herb Brooks who once said that great moments are born from great opportunity.

Who knows? Maybe in the year of the Knicks in this city, Shelton will have himself a Knicks moment, and end a different kind of waiting in his sport, the long wait for an American man to win the U.S. Open since Andy Roddick in 2003.

After Shelton had beaten another American, Frances Tiafoe, in a four-set semifinal on Friday night, he was talking about what it was like to play a match like that at Ashe, with the usual array celebrities in the house.

“Oh shoot,” he said, smiling, talking about looking up into the crowd. “Jalen Brunson is here.”

Then he said, “It should be pretty fun for New York City on Sunday.”

Big fun for a kid with such a big game, and even bigger serve than Pete Sampras did when he was the American star winning the Open. Pete, in fact, won his last Open the year before Roddick did, in September of ‘02. When Roddick succeeded Pete as champ, we thought that men’s tennis still belonged to us. But then it belonged to Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic, who would eventually win 66 majors among them. Then along came Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner, who have already won a dozen majors of their own.

Now Shelton has his chance to join the club, and do it here; do it in front of a tennis crowd that will try to make the kind of sports sound for Shelton that it once did next door when a left-handed American named Jimmy Connors was lighting up Louis Armstrong Stadium back in 1991.

If Shelton does win the Open Sunday, he will probably feel as if he’s won the title for the second time in a week. That’s because of the thrilling way he took out the defending champ — Alcaraz — in five sets that didn’t end until the clock at Ashe said they had gone past 3:30 in the morning in a fifth-set match tiebreaker. A quarterfinal that looked every bit like a final.

Only once before had Alcaraz ever lost a fifth set. The record for Alcaraz before Shelton was 15-1 in five-setters. Shelton made it 15-2 by winning four of the last five points in set number five. Shelton played like a complete star, out of Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning. Even at the very end he was trying to hit serves 150 mph. Now he needs to figure out a way against Zverev’s own big serve — after Zverev’s finished bouncing the ball what feels like a hundred times — to win the Open. Shelton: Trying to have his New York moment, what will feel like one for the ages even at his young age if he wins.

“I’m going for it here,” he said on Friday night.

“This is where we want to be,” he said.

“I know what my goal is,” Ben Shelton said. “I know what my job is.”

He has his chance to make himself a big story in sports even on a day when we get such a full schedule of NFL football, all the way until the Giants open against the Cowboys on Sunday Night Football. It is Week 1 for pro football. It is different in men’s tennis once the final kicks off at 2 on Sunday afternoon. This is the last major of the year, but one that can be such an amazing beginning for Ben Shelton.

Zverev won his first career major at the French Open, managing to do that without having to beat Sinner, who got sick and lost early, or Alcaraz, still recovering from a wrist injury at the time. Zverev has also been the beneficiary of a dream draw at this Open, despite having middle-of-the-night dramas of his own along the way. In addition to this being his third major final of the year, it is also his fourth semifinal.

Shelton beat the player, Alcaraz, who is the best player in the world when healthy. Now he gets Zverev, who’s had a better Grand Slam year than anybody.

“I’m doing things I haven’t done before,” Shelton said after he beat his friend Tiafoe.

Zverev’s last two matches have been straight-setters. Shelton played those five sets and four hours and 28 minutes against Alcaraz. Then he played four more hard sets against Tiafoe, that match ended up against 11 o’clock. So nine sets already for Shelton this week. Nearly eight hours on the court. Maybe it won’t matter to a 23-year-old playing the best tennis of his life. We will see about that at Ashe, in what will feel like one of the most important tennis moments the place has ever had.

Mostly we will see if this really is Ben Shelton’s time. He’ll be the home team today. Looking for his own great moment. Maybe, just maybe, New York is about to have another one of those.

A GUY NAMED JOE

Over the past 25 years, I have written more than once about Sept. 11, 2001, remembering that day and the ones that followed in New York.

I’ve done my best trying to describe it was like to be an American in that time, and also as someone who had worked in New York City as long as I had, and have.

And what it was like to be the son of Bene Lupica, who had joined the Army Air Force at the age of 20 and then flown 31 missions as a bombardier in B24’s over Europe. My Pops: Who had lived long enough — almost 60 years exactly from when he’d gone off to fight World War II — and had now seen his country attacked out of the sky like this.

I’ve written of what it was like to be a parent of four children, and worrying and wondering what kind of world this had become.

Mostly, I’ve written about what sports was like in those days after the planes hit our buildings, and how much the games mattered when they were being played again.

“Never forget” will always be part of our litany about that time.

We will never forget what sports made us feel like in the long, terrible shadow of that terrible day, from Mike Piazza’s home run at old Shea through those truly unforgettable World Series nights later at the old Yankee Stadium.

So here is one more memory I’ve shared before — but not for a long time — about a wonderful guy from our town named Joe Coppo, whom I knew from coaching Little League baseball.

(Later, by a quirk of fate, his son John and my oldest son, Christopher, would be roommates for a time in New York City.)

Joe, an old Manhattan University (Manhattan College in his day) ballplayer himself, worked for Cantor Fitzgerald, and died on the 104th floor on Sept. 11, 2001.

Two weeks later, on a Saturday morning as beautiful and brilliant as the morning of Sept. 11 had been, his funeral was at the church I attend, St. Aloysius.

Standing in back of the packed church that day, I had no way of knowing that sports was about to provide one more memory to stir the soul.

Because when it was time for the Presentation of the Gifts during Mass, here came the members of the last team Joe ever coached, an All-Star travel team of 13-year-olds.

All of the kids were dressed in white uniforms that looked brand new.

One of them caried the team’s championship trophy, another carried a bat, another carried a bat that had belonged to Joe.

Then they all made their way solemnly to where Joe’s casket was in front of the altar.

And somehow the scene made you want to cry and cheer at the same time.

Later Joe’s widow Pat would tell me this about her husband:

“I could write chapters about all the tales Joe came home with after a practice or a game, funny, sad, poignant, exciting — sometimes even tear-jerking. But there was nothing that made Joe smile more than seeing one of his, uh, less athletic players finally get that first hit or catch.”

Maybe one of the All-Stars at this Requiem Mass had once been a player like that.

But now they were here and, in all the big ways, so was the big bear of a man who used to coach them.

Brought together one last time by their love of baseball, and love for this man.

I wrote that day that even if you didn’t know Joe Coppo, you did, because every town has somebody like him.

Much later Bobby Valentine, who’d grown up in the next town over from ours, would come over on another Saturday morning and help us dedicate Joe Coppo Field.

“I hope the memory of what Joe meant to his community will live forever,” Bobby said.

Now the field will be there forever.

Kids are still playing ball at Joe Coppo Field in the spring and summer, and always will be.

There are so many lovely memorials honoring the victims of Sept. 11 worth knowing about.

This field is just one more, honoring one more person who didn’t make it home that day.