Carlos Alcaraz is a champion establishing how high he will climb with latest Wimbledon title

When did you know that the 2024 Wimbledon men’s final wasn’t going to be a repeat of last year’s classic, but a blowout instead?

You could make a case that the moment came in the opening game of the match, which lasted 13 minutes and 20 points, and ended with Novak Djokovic making two uncharacteristic errors and getting broken. From the start, he looked all of his 37 years. His steps were slow, his spirit was muted, he couldn’t stay with Alcaraz from the baseline, and he couldn’t put the ball away at the net, either. At the same time, Alcaraz looked all of his 21 years. His serves skidded off the lines in the 130s, his forehands were hit too hard for anyone’s defenses, even Djokovic’s, to handle, and his passing shots were laser-guided into the open court every time. For the first time at this tournament, Alcaraz came out firing, and didn’t let up.

If the first game seems too early to have decided anything, you might make a case that the match essentially ended early in the second set, when Alcaraz, already up a set and a break, annihilated a crosscourt backhand, and then followed it with a teasing, looping, slow-moving, crosscourt forehand that Djokovic was too far out of position to do anything about. We’ve seen Djokovic lose Grand Slam finals before. We’ve seen him get routed before. But I don’t think we’ve ever seen him get toyed with along the way.

Still, this was a Grand Slam final, and this was a seven-time Wimbledon champion, which meant that nothing was over, and no blowout could be official, until the final ball was struck. Everyone understands that cliché in theory, but rarely does it come as true as it did on Sunday.

By the time Alcaraz served for the match at 5-4 in the third, all the tension and suspense had gone out of the arena. Djokovic walked out to return serve well before chair umpire James Keothavong called time, and he shot his camp a wry smile of resignation as he waited at the baseline. Alcaraz cruised to a 40-0 love lead; the off-balance backhand that Djokovic put into the net to set up triple championship point seemed like a fitting end to his forgettable day.

Then, on the brink of victory, Alcaraz took a little more time than normal to serve. Then he double faulted. Then he couldn’t handle a Djokovic return. That made the score 40-30; his three chances at the title had dwindled to one. On the next point, Alcaraz fired a big first serve wide, and settled under Djokovic’s harmless, high-arcing return for what would surely be a match-winning swing volley. But with the ball on the way down, someone in the audience screamed, and Alcaraz hit the ball wide. After 25 games of effortless domination, nerves had finally seized him, and Djokovic had his first and only service break. The score was 5-5, and the tension was very much back in the arena.

Rather than signaling the start of a meltdown, though, Alcaraz’s momentary lapse gave him a chance to show how well he could handle the pressure. In the third-set tiebreaker, despite missing two shots by less than an inch, he stepped up to serve with a 5-4 lead, and the title once again on his racquet. That’s when, after all of his other brilliant shots, he hit the one that mattered most: A delicate forehand drop shot that Djokovic didn’t even try to chase down. One point later, Alcaraz had his fourth Grand Slam title (in just 14 tries), his second straight Wimbledon, and his first Channel Slam. The blowout was complete.

“Obviously it was a great match for me,” Alcaraz said. “Obviously Novak didn’t play his best the first two sets, a lot of mistakes. I made the most of that.”

Not surprisingly, he emphasized his superb serving day. It was a shot he had struggled with earlier in the tournament.

“The first match I had a really poor serve game,” said Alcaraz, who won 84 percent of his first-serve points in the final. “I knew that I have to be better on that. The days off, I was practicing the serve. I was really focus on the serve to be better.”

“It allowed me to be a little more calm, and to think a little more clear,” he told ESPN’s Chris McKendry.

Obviously Novak didn’t play his best the first two sets, a lot of mistakes. I made the most of that. —Carlos Alcaraz

As for Djokovic, he bowed to Alcaraz.

“I was inferior on the court, that’s it,” Djokovic said. “He was a better player. He played every single shot better than I did.”

“He was reading the serve. He was playing with a lot of variety. I’ve never seen him serve that way, to be honest.”

The Big 3 era began when Roger Federer won his first Grand Slam title, at Wimbledon in 2003. It’s tempting, after watching today’s match, to speculate that it may have ended today, 21 years later. But I won’t go that far. Djokovic says he’s going to carry on, to the Olympics next month, and back to the All England Club next year. He may not have a title in 2024, but he has made a Slam final and semi.

What we can say is that the Big 3 era looked a little weary on Sunday. In Djokovic, we saw a champion who was, finally, not at his peak. In Alcaraz, we saw another champion who looked like he was just beginning to show us how high he’s going to climb.