The central question was straightforward in the Indian Wells fourth-round clash pitting Andy Murray against Milos Raonic.  Could Raonic deliver enough first strikes to hit Murray off the court, or would the two-time major champion blunt the Canadian’s rough-hewn weapons while outmaneuvering him with his consistency and variety?

To scant surprise, the answer to this question needed three sets and over two hours to emerge.  Raonic had won two of his previous three meetings with Murray, but they never had squared off on a slow hard court like the surface at the BNP Paribas Open.  Both men had produced uneven form in the earlier rounds, Raonic needing a final-set tiebreak to survive his first match and Murray twice rallying from losing the first set.

The Scot again started slowly, but errant returns from his opponent let him off the hook in the early stages.  Seemingly out of nowhere, Murray then reeled off 10 straight points to win the first set.  Raonic’s shoulders slumped after he surrendered his serve at love in the ninth game, a rare occurrence for a man who already had struck 50 aces in the tournament.  When Murray closed out the set without ado, a routine win looked like a distinct possibility for the former Indian Wells finalist.

Despite his drooping body language, however, Raonic clung to his serve in the second set.  He stopped Murray’s momentum in its tracks by earning free points with unanswerable bombs and by pouncing with his forehand on any short balls.  The belief that he had lacked late in the first set seemed to gradually resurface.  Although Murray held serve until 5-5, chinks began to emerge in his armor.  His first-serve percentage began to drop, while his consistency from the baseline ebbed.

A string of tepid groundstroke errors handed Raonic triple set point in the 12th game of the second set, just as a tiebreak loomed.  The Canadian converted his second chance by outflanking Murray near the net, an excellent sign for a giant not famous for his finesse.  As Murray’s movement sagged, Raonic’s movement seemed to quicken as he sensed the possibility of an upset.  (Spending over 15 hours on court over the last two weeks in Acapulco and Indian Wells also may have sapped Murray’s energy.)

If Murray had not succeeded in building on his strong finish to the first set, Raonic failed even more dismally at building on his strong finish to the second set.  A pair of netted forehands handed the Scot an early break of serve.  The finish line lay well within range if Murray simply could continue to hold serve.

That was exactly what he could not do.  Winning just three points in his next two service games, the two-time major champion shifted the match back from his racquet to his opponent’s racquet.  Few players, even of Murray’s quality, can survive when handing Raonic a chance to serve out a match.  The Canadian answered the bell once again, improving to 3-1 against the Scot with a match-ending love hold.  Raonic never has defeated Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, or Roger Federer, but he appears to have solved the other member of the ATP Big Four.

As impressive as Raonic’s resilience and strong finish were, Murray’s dismal form in the third set played an equally significant role in the outcome.  He noted afterward that he missed many routine groundstrokes, including his normally sparkling backhand, that he would have made 99 times out of 100.  Sounding more concerned than after his losses earlier this season, Murray cited a lack of confidence as the only logical explanation.  On the bright side, he feels fully fit and healthy heading to Miami, a tournament where he has earned much greater success than in the desert.  Indian Wells remains the only Masters 1000 tournament on an outdoor hard court where Murray has not won the title.  As he observed, he has fallen into a pattern there of losses to heavy hitters such as Robin Soderling, Juan Martin del Potro, and now Raonic.

While a door closed for Murray, still title-less since Wimbledon, a door opened for the man who mastered him.  A finalist at the Montreal Masters 1000 event on his home soil last year, Raonic eyes a chance to reach the semifinals or better on an even more significant stage.  His quarterfinal will pit him against 28th seed Alexandr Dolgopolov, whose transcendent effort toppled Rafael Nadal two rounds ago.  Still, Raonic will enter that encounter as the favorite.  If he can back up his Murray upset with another strong performance, Canadian fans will feel more hopeful that he can emerge from his stagnation over the last several months.

Raonic acknowledged the impact of Murray’s errors on the outcome but also credited his own clutch play in the third set and improved belief against the elite.  He confirmed reports that more confidence circulates in the locker room after Stanislas Wawrinka’s upsets of Djokovic and Nadal at the Australian Open, which others have interpreted to reveal vulnerability in the Big Four.  Raonic observed that attitude and belief matter as much as tactics and technique in giving underdogs a chance at such upsets.

The Canadian No. 1 knows that Dolgopolov will do everything in his power to disrupt his rhythm and timing in their quarterfinal.  Confident that nothing can affect his efficiency on serve, Raonic said that he will enter that encounter determined to control the center of the court and shorten points without giving Dolgopolov the time to craft his clever combinations.  This contrast of styles should create an entertaining, albeit unexpected, quarterfinal.