HOW CILIC BECAME KING OF THE QUEEN CITY

CROATIAN SPEAKS AHEAD OF 10-YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF CINCY CROWN

By Grant Thompson

A decade later, Marin Cilic still remembers the whirlwind of his 2016 Cincinnati Open title run.

After a late-night, semi-final thriller against Grigor Dimitrov extended into Sunday morning, Cilic went to bed at 4 a.m. and returned to court that afternoon to end Andy Murray’s 22-match winning streak and claim the Rookwood Cup.

“It was one of my best weeks in my career,” reflected Cilic after a Thursday practice session in the afternoon heat. “At the start of my career, I didn’t play my best here in Cincy,” he added, referring to his 1-4 record in his first four appearances.

“When I got that run, it was unbelievable tennis.”

Now 37, Cilic is making his 14th appearance at the ATP Masters 1000 event. Reflecting on his title run with a smile, Cilic, a father of two sons, is sporting a temporary sparkle tattoo on his left arm, inked on him during the tournament’s Kids Day.

“It does feel like a long time ago, but also the years go so quickly,” recalled Cilic. “When you are on the Tour, you just focus on performance, the progress, how far you can go, what you can achieve and then years become months and months become weeks.”

The former No. 3 boasts the second-most wins amongst active players, only behind Novak Djokovic. Competing mostly in an era dominated by the ‘Big Three’ — Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Djokovic — Cilic has amassed 21 tour-level titles.

The 2014 US Open champion earned the second-biggest trophy of his career in Cincinnati, lifting his lone ATP Masters 1000 crown two years after triumphing in New York.

“You don’t have so many chances like that and opportunities during your career,” said Cilic, who beat a gauntlet of talent en route to the Cincinnati title: Viktor Troicki, Fernando Verdasco, Tomas Berdych, Borna Coric, Dimitrov and top seed Murray, four of those six players now retired from the sport. (Dimitrov would win the Cincy trophy the next year and Coric did so in 2022.)

“Especially when you are feeling that well, you just brush the fatigue out and go do what you need to do,” Cilic said.

Cilic’s semi-final clash with Dimitrov was one of the tournament’s most memorable matches that year. Finishing around 1:40 a.m., Cilic battled past the Bulgarian 4-6, 6-3, 7-5 and hilariously said post-match, “It was completely King’s Island. We were on this side of the road,” a nod to the amusement park that sits across I-71.

Cilic said in an interview at the time that he went to sleep around 4 a.m. Then, 12 hours later, he stood across the net from Murray, who entered the final on a 22-match winning streak, with titles at Queen’s Club, Wimbledon and an Olympic gold medal in Rio.

How did Cilic recover from the dramatic, late-night finish and summon the energy to compete in his first ATP Masters 1000 final?

“The adrenaline just pumps in before the match,” Cilic said. “You’re in that kind of a tournament mindset. As soon as I got into the match, I was feeling good and hitting the ball very sweet.”

Cilic beat Murray 6-4, 7-5 in the final, a hard-earned reward for the then-27-year-old after a summer spent accumulating airline miles. In the span of just seven weeks, Cilic went from Wimbledon to Portland, Oregon (for a Davis Cup tie against the U.S.), then to Toronto and to Brazil for the Rio Olympics, eventually arriving in Cincinnati. Not even jet lag could stop Cilic.

“The 2016 season had been quite good for me up to that point,” said Cilic, a quarter-finalist at Wimbledon that year. “When I got here, straight away from the first ball I played unbelievable tennis — really aggressive, served unbelievably well.”

Though Murray would defeat Cilic in 12 of their 15 head-to-head matches, that blustery Sunday afternoon belonged to the Croatian. Murray earned his revenge on Cilic later that year at the 2016 Nitto ATP Finals, their final meeting on Tour. The Brit went on to finish 2016 as ATP Year-End No. 1, beating Djokovic in a winner-take-all final for the top spot — the first time since 2000 the year-end No. 1 honor was decided in the season’s final match.

“The matches with Andy were always quite tricky, quite difficult because he doesn’t give you any rhythm,” Cilic said “He always played tactically really well, keeping you off balance and he doesn’t let you play your best. I felt that throughout the whole match that my level had been incredible.”

Walking back from his practice Thursday, Cilic was warmly greeted by fans around the Lindner Family Tennis Center. Some asked for autographs and selfies; another offered a fist bump and called out, “You’re awesome!”, drawing a grin from Cilic.

The moment took me back to attending this tournament as a child, when I once asked Cilic about his favorite part of being on the ATP Tour. “Winning,” he said in a simple, one-word answer.

Cilic, who will turn 38 at the end of September, is still doing his share of winning, with two knee surgeries in 2024 helping extend his career. He is glad to be back in the Queen City on the 10-year anniversary of his title run, and for the first time in four years.

“It’s incredible to see the transformation of the whole venue,” said Cilic, praising the $260 million facility renovation, completed in 2025. “I’ve been coming here since 2008 and at the start it was one week for guys, one week for girls. And then after it was combined [in 2011]. Just an incredible job at the tournament and a pleasure to be here.”