Until about a week ago, even Chris Eubanks did not really believe he was capable of this sort of thing — of beating the world's best tennis players at Wimbledon, of reaching the quarterfinals at any Grand Slam tournament, of winning match after match after match on grass courts.

“I would show up to tour events saying, Oh, can I get through a couple of rounds of here?'” he said during an interview the day before play began at the All England Club. “Now I genuinely can say, probably for the first time, I'm showing up to tournaments with higher expectations and really wanting to do well and put my best foot forward. I'm no longer feeling OK just being there. I know that I belong.” 

 “It's surreal. I can't really describe it,” said Eubanks, who is from Atlanta and played college tennis at Georgia Tech. “I just think the entire experience, all together, has just been a whirlwind. It's been something that you dream about,” Eubanks said. "I didn't really know if that dream would actually come true. I'm sitting here in it now, so it's pretty cool.“

He is ranked a career-best 43rd right now and had a win-loss record of merely 6-10 before going on the run to the trophy at Mallorca, Spain, on July 1. That came on grass, which he decided he hated a month ago — calling it “the stupidest surface” in a text he sent to International Tennis Hall of Fame member Kim Clijsters — after exiting in the second round at a low-level ATP Challenger Tour event.

He even had retired from tennis after Covid-19. He still remembers telling his agent "Listen, if I’m still 200 by next year and injuries haven’t played a part, I can do something else with my time. It’s not that glamorous if you’re ranked around 200." 

Eubanks even started doing commentary on the Tennis Channel, and was thinking about alternate careers if he didn't break through. Yet, he's been on a hot streak lately, winning his first ATP title in Mallorca in the lead-up to Wimbledon.