Cruz Hewitt Wins ATP Tour Debut, 22 Years After Father Lleyton’s Washington Title

Cruz Hewitt announced himself on the ATP Tour in style. The 17-year-old Australian, son of former world No. 1 Lleyton Hewitt, defeated American qualifier Marcos Giron 6-3, 6-4 in just 74 minutes on Tuesday, winning his first-ever tour-level main draw match at the Mubadala DC Open — the same tournament his father famously claimed in 2004, four years before Cruz was born.

A Composed Debut Against Top-100 Opposition

Ranked No. 612 in the world, Hewitt didn’t just survive his ATP main-draw debut — he dominated it. He won 83 percent of his first-serve points and didn’t face a single break point across the entire match, closing things out with a forehand winner before celebrating with his father’s trademark fist-pump celebration. His attacking numbers backed up the eye test: he converted 87 percent of his attacking points against a tour average of 67 percent, and held his own defensively too, winning 41 percent of points in defense against a tour average of 33 percent — all against a Giron, a player ranked inside the top 100 and a former world No. 37.

Following in Famous Footsteps

The win carries obvious echoes of his father’s own breakthrough. Lleyton Hewitt won his first tour-level match at age 16 back in January 1998 in Adelaide — a tournament he went on to win outright. Cruz’s victory also puts the Hewitts in rare company: the only other member of the ATP’s No. 1 Club whose son has also won a tour-level match is Bjorn Borg, whose son Leo Borg accomplished the same feat.

Speaking after the win, Cruz reflected on the emotional weight of doing it at the same tournament where his dad once lifted the trophy, calling it a special, surreal moment to get his first tour win at the same event his father won years before he was born.

A Season Building Toward This Moment

Hewitt’s run to Washington’s main draw wasn’t a fluke. He arrived off a breakout junior season, reaching his first Grand Slam junior final at Wimbledon just weeks earlier, falling just short of the title in a dramatic three-set battle. That performance — where he beat four seeded players without dropping a set en route to the final — convinced Washington organizers to hand him a wildcard into ATP-level qualifying.

Getting through qualifying was dramatic in its own right: Hewitt battled back from the brink against Zachary Svajda, saving a match point situation before the American retired injured in the deciding set — Hewitt’s second straight qualifying win via opponent retirement.

What’s Next

The win rockets Hewitt more than 250 places up the live ATP rankings to a career-high No. 357. He now awaits the winner of a blockbuster all-contender clash between top seed Alex de Minaur and former world No. 3 Stefanos Tsitsipas, with a shot at an all-Australian second-round matchup against his countryman and mentor de Minaur firmly in play.