The scoreboard was window dressing. Fans were guests. Tickets were invitations. Competition became a celebration. The match was a gala. 

And the belle of the ball danced — and twirled — on. 

Serena Williams will play another day (or night). The Queen of Queens will move onto the second round following Monday’s first-round 6-3, 6-3 victory over Danka Kovinik, the overmatched deer in the headlights on the other side of the net. 

This was, of course, the first round of the U.S. Open. It was played at Arthur Ashe Stadium on the grounds of the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. There could not be a more fitting venue for Williams’ goodbye to Tennis America than this place that honors its sport’s pioneers every single day of the year. 

Williams, who will turn 41 on the 26th of next month, has announced that she is evolving away from her career. Everyone expects that this will be the final tournament of a decorated pro career that commenced at the age of 16. There is no final Derek Jeter-Mariano Rivera-type victory lap ahead even as she danced around the question whether this would represent the end of her competitive days. 

“I’ve been pretty vague about it,” Serena said when asked if in fact this would represent her last tournament. “I think I’ll stay vague.” 

There was little drama in this one on Monday. Kovinik just wasn’t up to the challenge when Williams had trouble getting out of the gate. The six-time Open champion faced 10 break points on five service games in the first set. She had trouble finishing points even as she was moving relatively well. 

Kovinik was serving for 4-2 when a Williams return clipped the baseline. That represented the first of 12 straight points for Serena. It also ended the competitive phase of the evening. Williams did not face a break point in the second set after saving four in the final game of the opening set. 

Again, though, this wasn’t so much of a match as a backdrop for honoring and appreciating Williams. Love flowed from the stands. The athlete blew kisses to the crowd when it was over. But of course it is not over. 

Round 2 beckons on Wednesday with second-seed Anett Kontaviet on the other side. This does not promise to be a walkover. This will represent a mighty challenge for Williams, who has now won two of her five matches after returning to tournament tennis at Wimbledon after a year in which she recovered from a torn hamstring and did a lot of the “evolving” things she will focus on in her next life. 

“At this point, everything is a bonus for me,” she said. “I think it’s good for me to live in the moment now.” 

Williams received a tumultuous ovation when she was introduced prior to the match. 

“It was really overwhelming,” she said. “It was so loud I could feel it in my chest and it was a feeling I’ll never forget. 

“It was like, ‘Is this for real, really? I still have a match to play.’ I wanted to be able to play up to the reception.” 

Williams has not always been embraced with such unanimity by the crowds at Flushing Meadows. She has won the tournament six times and this is where she won her first Grand Slam title in 1999 as an 18-year-old. But she has also endured some of the lowest moments of her career in Queens. 

She has suffered meltdowns in interactions with lines-people and umpires that were legendary and brought heaps of scorn upon her that escaped the likes of Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe — before that Ilya Nastase — when they routinely and often crudely acted out. 

There was the shocking semifinal defeat in 2015 to Roberta Vinci when Williams was only two matches away from completing the Grand Slam that had been achieved in the Open era by only Rod Laver and Steffi Graf. That was a Mike Tyson-Buster Douglas or 1969 Colts-Jets Super Bowl moment. 

Williams has been a lightning rod at times. But not to those whom she has empowered. She has been a champion of women’s rights, of rights for people of color and marginalized communities. She has been the people’s champion for, well, for decades. If she sometimes made the subsection of white men feel uncomfortable at times, well, so much the better. 

Serena is a complicated individual who, in tandem with her sister Venus, revolutionized the sport. She opened — banged open — doors so that Naomi Osaka, Coco Gauff, Madison Keys and Sloane Stephens could walk through them. A new tennis demographic has grown in the Williams sisters’ footsteps. 

“This sport has given me a platform that I never thought I’d have,” said Serena, who has been hailed in recent days by Gauff and Osaka. “I’m grateful they think that way about me but I don’t overthink it. 

“I’m still here … for the time being.” 

The Queen’s Gambit plays on.