Sabalenka pauses US Open match over cannabis smell, advances to fourth round

At Flushing Meadows, where the boundaries between city life and elite competition have always been porous, the smell of cannabis drifted into Louis Armstrong Stadium on Thursday and briefly interrupted Aryna Sabalenka's march toward a third consecutive US Open title. The world's top seed paused her match to alert the umpire before composing herself and winning in straight sets — but the moment illuminated a quiet, unresolved tension between New York's legal cannabis culture and the expectations of professional sport. She is not the first to notice, and almost certainly will not be the last.