Heading into Sunday’s action there were 32 men and 32 women left vying for the singles title and every seeded player (1-32) had played one match.

It’s always fascinating then to look for the upsets. What parts of the draw saw the seeded players lose their first match and can we learn anything about who might have an edge moving forward among the top four seeds?

A quick check on the two draws reveals some interesting things. The men’s draw has seen remarkable success for the seeded players. Of the 32 seeded men, 27 won their first-round match. And one of those eliminated seeds was a withdrawal by No. 30 Tomas Etcheverry.

The result is two entire quarters of the draw saw all eight seeds hold serve. Those were No. 3 Jannik Sinner’s quarter and No. 4 Daniil Medvedev’s quarter. So consider their regions still as stacked as they can be.

The most fortunate top seed appears to be No. 1 Novak Djokovic, who has seen three of the eight seeds in his quarter eliminated, including No. 8 Hubert Hurkacz who lost to Gael Monfils, as well as No. 23 Alejandro Davidovich Fokina who lost to Arthur Fils and also Etcheverry’s withdrawal.

Carlos Alcaraz’s quarter lost the No. 15 seed Karen Khachanov who lost to Thiago Seyboth-Wild and No. 24 seed Nicholas Jarry who lost to Fabian Marozsan. Coincidentally, the two unseeded players Seyboth-Wild and Marozsan play each other. But all the other top seeds remain.

The women’s draw has almost been the polar opposite. Only 19 of the 32 seeded players won their first match as 13 unseeded players are still alive.

The strangest quarter has to be the one vacated by No. 4 seed Elena Rybakina. She wound up being the only one of the eight seeds in her quarter eliminated. However, No. 7 seed Marketa Vondrousova also had to pull out after winning her first match. So that quarter of the draw is moving forward without its top two players. The highest-seeded player remaining is No. 12 Beatriz Haddad Maia. Should be interesting to see who makes the semifinal from that group.

The quarter topped by No. 3 Coco Gauff saw five of its eight seeded players lose, so you could say she might have the mathematical easiest path moving forward.

Iga Swiatek, the No. 1 seed, saw four of the ranked players in her quarter eliminated, including the other two top-ranked players in No. 6 Ons Jabeur and No. 10 Jelena Ostapenko, so the highest seed in her quarter other than herself is No. 17 Veronika Kudermetova.

No. 2 seed Aryna Sabalenka had three seeded players lose in her draw, including No. 5 Jessica Pegula.

So by reviewing the draw after the second round, you can see how upsets have affected the field when it comes to the top players. It’s not an exact science, of course, but it’s fair to say that things have opened up a bit for Djokovic, Alcaraz, Gauff and Swiatek and not so much for Sinner, Medvedev and Sabalenka.

Shad Powers is a columnist for The Desert Sun. Reach him at [email protected].