Serena storms into quarters in record-smashing style

Juan Martin del Potro, Andy Murray and the Williams sisters are among those seeking to book their spots in the quarterfinals on Labor Day Monday at the U.S. Open. For that to be in a grand slam is pretty cool.

Sixth seed Venus, twice the champion in NY, faces Karolina Pliskova, the big-serving 10th seed from the Czech Republic.

Serena came down hard on Kazakhstan’s Yaroslava Shvedova 6-2, 6-3 in a scant 68 minutes. She won an incredible 93 percent of her first serves, 28 of 30.

But it was not a cruising win for Wawarinka, who was stretched to a thrilling five set affair by Great Britain player, Daniel Evans.

In fact, despite the injury fears sparked by the sore shoulder that hampered her at the Rio Olympics she has barely been challenged since arriving at Flushing Meadows, where she claimed the first of her six US Open titles in 1999.

Two-time major champion Stan Wawrinka blew a lead, smashed a racket and eventually pulled out a four-set victory to reach his fourth straight U.S. Open quarterfinal.

Williams, who has not been broken all tournament yet, will next face No. 5 seed Simona Halep in the quarterfinals.

Serena Williams, the world’s top woman tennis player, now has the most Grand Slam match victories for any man or woman in the Open era. For the tournament, she’s unbroken and has faced only one break point.

Still, Williams will be the heavy favorite to make the semifinals, and a 23rd Grand Slam title is more than attainable if she can get past Halep.

Serena’s 308-42 record in Grand Slam matches equates to a winning percentage of almost 91 percent.

Williams, holding another service break in hand in the second set, soon served for the match just after the one hour mark. She then broke Suarez Navarro’s serve in the next game and successfully served it out in her second opportunity. He returned to the court for one point before deciding he couldn’t go on. Williams fired down three aces and a final big serve to secure the comfortable 6-2, 6-3 historic win.

Fourth-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska is in the nightcap on Ashe, taking on 92nd-ranked Ana Konjuh.