If you closed your eyes and just listened, you’d swear Australian tennis had just been taken back almost 30 years.

The thunderous ground strokes, the compulsive emotional releases, a little bit of debating with the umpire, an obligatory shirt change due to saturation, the chest beating to all corners of the arena when clawing back to win when not even the most eternal optimist would have thought it possible.

It’s inevitable Cruz Hewitt will have to live with the comparisons to his legendary father Lleyton, who at 16 years old was toppling Andre Agassi in his first ATP event all those years ago.

But it’s also unfair to his teenage son, who plays in a completely different era against completely different styles. Yet for almost three bruising hours on Ken Rosewall Arena on Tuesday, a Hewitt did Hewitt things.

Down a set and a break as his wily veteran left-handed opponent Omar Jasika served for the match, Hewitt kept his head above water and broke serve, roaring to his supporters conspicuously sitting in different parts of the venue, including Lleyton’s old coach Tony Roche.

That was good, but what about what happened next?

Hewitt trailed 5-1 in the tiebreak, and then facing three match points when down 6-3, he rattled off five straight points to win the second set. You just knew with a toehold in the match, a Hewitt wouldn’t let it slip from there.

Scoring his second win at ATP Challenger level in a week, Cruz went on to down Jasika 3-6, 7-6(6), 6-4 in the first round of the Perpetual NSW Open at Sydney Olympic Park. It was a long leap from the last time he clashed with Jasika, taking just four games en route to an ITF loss in Bali last year.

For the couple of hundred spectators who took advantage of free entry into the venue, they got a glimpse into what the future of Australian tennis might look like as Hewitt set up a second round clash Japanese wildcard Hayato Matsuoka.

Matsuoka advanced after third seed Bernard Tomic retired one point into the second set of their match when hampered by a leg injury.

Hewitt scored the biggest win of his young career last week when he eased past James McCabe in the first round of a Challenger event in Brisbane, and backed it up quickly with his second.

There was little drama for men’s top seed James Duckworth, who swept past countryman Moerani Bouzige 6-4, 6-1, while No.2 seed Rinky Hijikata rallied after dropping the second set to Jamaican lucky loser Blaise Bicknell to win 6-4, 5-7, 6-2 on an outside court.

On the women’s side, Lizette Cabrera scored the biggest upset of the day after beating Ukraine’s second seed Yuliia Starodubtseva 6-2, 7-5 on Ken Rosewall Arena.

Cabrera, 27, continued her solid season with a host of big names – including top seed Kimberly Birrell, Talia Gibson and Maddison Inglis – due to play their first round matches on Wednesday as the W75 draw starts to take shape.

Entry is free into the Sydney Olympic Park venue for matches throughout the week, with Lleyton and Cruz Hewitt to play doubles for the first time together at ATP Challenger level when they take on fellow Australian wildcards Hayden Jones and Pavle Marinkov.

The match is scheduled to start not before 5pm on Ken Rosewall Arena.