Jelena Dokic triumphed over adversity merely by playing in the 2009 Australian Open on Monday. Five nights and three match wins later, the transplanted Australian can now say that her tennis game, not just her heart, is on the mend. In the most gripping story of the year’s first Grand Slam event, the woman whose career once lay in ruins is now in the round of 16.

The resurrection of Jelena Dokic from the rubble of paternal abuse and rock-bottom depression has tugged at the heartstrings of Australia, the nation Dokic adopted at age 11 but then abandoned in 2001. When Dokic chose to play for Yugoslavia in that year’s Australian Open, she did so because a family member left her little room for dissent.

Damir Dokic ranks alongside Jim Pierce (father of two-time Grand Slam singles champion Mary Pierce) as an iconically abusive tennis parent. Damir verbally punished his child at every turn in what was a controlling and darkly manipulative relationship. When Damir steered Jelena to play for Yugoslavia in 2001, he based his decision on a delusional claim that Tennis Australia “fixed” the tournament draw so that his daughter would have to play defending champion Lindsay Davenport in the first round. Damir’s ugly and obsessive behavior tormented Jelena so thoroughly that the young talent–who eventually attained a world No. 4 ranking in 2002–couldn’t possibly hope to have a steady head on her shoulders. Never comfortable in her own skin, Dokic insulted opponents and ran short on patience in a sport that demands a bottomless well of serenity. The fun couldn’t possibly last, and when she split from Damir–who doubled as her coach–in 2003, a precipitous downward slide commenced for a girl with a shattered heart.

Tossed around by the stormy seas of her family life, Dokic crashed after 2004, reaching the main draw at only one Grand Slam singles event from 2005 through 2008. It was hard enough to maintain a sense of wholeness in the face of a public breakup with the man who trained her to be an elite women’s singles player. It was far more difficult, however, to maintain the same level of tennis that propelled Dokic to the 2000 Wimbledon semifinals and the 2002 French Open quarterfinals. Free from her father spatially and geographically, Jelena couldn’t run from the long shadow Damir had cast over her life.

Not until now, at least.

Dokic, at 25, is far removed from her days as a hotheaded and deeply confused teenager. Renewed in her commitment to Australia and regretful of her decision to leave the country in the first place, this transformed woman– whose biological tennis clock was ticking loudly at the start of this season–has now won three matches in front of emotional home crowds on the central court of the Melbourne Park tennis complex. Her latest conquest, a gritty 3-6, 6-1, 6-2 triumph over 11th-seeded Caroline Wozniacki, propelled the world’s 187th-ranked player to the final 16. Hollywood scripts would be hard pressed to display a narrative as classically redemptive as the one that’s unfolding Down Under. The person whose outbursts used to be defined by a dark negativity and pronounced runaway arrogance are now fist pumps of joy and pleasure. The emoting seen in the face Jelena Dokic–back at home in Australia in more ways than one–now possesses passion and purpose, and not the pent-up frustrations of a player whose personal life was a slow-motion train wreck.

As great as the Jelena Dokic story has already been–and as moving as it will always be, no matter what happens in the future–there’s one little reality that bears discussion at the present moment: Namely, Dokic actually has a chance to make a really deep run in Melbourne.

If you look at the top half of the women’s singles draw, you’ll find that while Dokic disposed of Wozniacki on Friday night, 29th-seeded Alysa Kleybanova of Russia dismissed No. 5 Ana Ivanovic in three emotionally involving but sloppy sets. Kleybanova defeated the reigning French Open champion despite having eight more errors than winners (44 to 36).

Ivanovic clearly lacked sting on her shots against her less-credentialed opponent, but the fact remains that Ivanovic possesses the big-match experience that can always be called upon in key situations. Dokic should be thrilled that she’ll face Kleybanova in Laver Arena when Sunday’s fourth round rolls along. Dokic should be favored in that match, and will have a chance to play in the quarterfinals.

It’s remarkable enough that Jelena Dokic has managed to win three straight three-set matches, two of them against top 20 players (Wozniacki in the third round, and No. 17 Anna Chakvetadze in Wednesday’s second round). Unfazed by the ups and downs that any three-set women’s match will bring, Dokic has been displaying the mental toughness of a world-wise competitor in the first week of this fortnight, in addition to some big-league skills. Anyone who wants to beat this supremely confident lady will have to conduct a master class in order to get the job done before a crowd of more than 15,000 Aussies who are squarely in Dokic’s corner. The one-and-done world of professional tennis means that Dokic, despite her low computer ranking and her recent absence from Grand Slam events, will be a very tough out as this tournament progresses.

It’s all too much, by any stretch of the human imagination: A week ago, Jelena Dokic was a tennis nobody. Now, she’s not only carrying a giddy nation on her back, but has a real chance to make a run at the Australian Open championship.

Just when you think you’ve seen it all in sports, a story like Jelena Dokic comes along to give tennis–and the larger scene of global athletics–a much-needed dose of freshness and poignancy. As improbable as it may seem, this magical narrative could only get better as time marches on in Melbourne.