Jannik Sinner admitted it wasn't easy at all to accept his painful French Open final defeat but also noted that he "could not keep crying" over the loss.

A transcendent match could not have been so in a shorter format — but Sinner and Alcaraz's exploits are the exception, not the rule.

They produced 5 1/2 hours of evidence Sunday that the game is in good hands — and that their rivalry will be, and perhaps already is, a transcendent one.