Toliver was a freshman then, perhaps too young for nerves to overcome her as she dribbled right, set her feet and put a high-arcing 3-pointer over a 6-foot-7 defender that swished softly through the net.
Four of Wednesday's five errors were made by minor league players as well, and Manager Joe Girardi said he thought the younger players' nerves were showing.
The upset means there will be no fifth consecutive all-Williams final in a Grand Slam event, and it was not the only surprise engineered today by a young, apparently nerve-free Russian.
One mechanism hypothesized to contribute to arthritic pain is ectopic nerve sprouting; however, neuroplasticity is generally thought to be greater in young versus old nerves.
The young Scot's nerves got the better of him in the opening frame and O'Sullivan capitalised in ruthless fashion, taking a 4-0 intervaleadad with breaks of 112, 79 and 82.
To be sure, Williams had lost a little weight, and her third-round win over the up-and-coming Ana Ivanovic had been reasonably impressive, though it owed more to the young Serb's nerves than anything else perhaps.
In a young player, however, nerves are not an unrepairable flaw: many players with similar tendencies, from Andre Agassi to Victoria Azarenka, have improved their self-belief and hence their performance under pressure.
They also let two gifted young actors create nerve-pricking studies in moral numbness shaped by an all-consuming sense of futility.
This extreme test of a young man's nerve and character was confirmed when Carter was declared fit and ready for the All Blacks' final game of 2012, during which they have gone 13 games without defeat.
Mr. Bentsen, who had arrived in Texas almost penniless himself in 1917, was impressed with the young man's nerve and initiative and took Mr. Manges under his wing.
