Australian Open: Sebastian Ofner loses qualifying match after prematurely celebrating victory

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Sebastian Ofner needed to heed the wise words of Yogi Berra and Lenny Kravitz during his Australian Open qualifying match on Wednesday:

“It ain't over 'til it's over"

The 29-year-old Austrian faced Nishesh Basavareddy in the second round of qualifying in hopes of making it to the tournament’s main draw.

After splitting the opening two sets in the best-of-three match, Ofner took a commanding 6-1 lead in the third set tiebreak. Thinking it was like an ATP Tour tiebreak, he won a seventh point and celebrated as if the match were over. Except that it wasn't, and the umpire had to remind Ofner that Grand Slam qualifiers are played to 10 points.

The match would then proceed to fall apart for Ofner, who would lose 12 of the next 16 points and ultimately the match to the 20-year-old American, who gave the Tyrese Haliburton/Reggie Miller “choke” gesture after the final point.

Basavareddy would take the match 4-6, 6-4, 7-6 [11] to set up a final round qualifier against George Loffhagen of Great Britain.

Ofner’s response to the hiccup was via an Instagram story where he posted simply, “S— happens.”