French Open 2013 Tennis: Lessons We Learned from Day 8 at Roland Garros

Day 8 is in the books at sprawling Stade Roland Garros, as four players from both the men's and women's field clinched their spots in the 2013 French Open quarterfinals.

Roger Federer stole the headlines in his battle with Gilles Simon, a plucky French player who won sets two and three. Federer's nine-year streak of Grand Slam quarterfinals was in jeopardy, but the Swiss stalwart found a way to battle back and keep his incredible run alive.

But even if Federer was the one making the biggest headlines, there was plenty else going on at Roland Garros on Sunday afternoon. And from those manifold happenings, a couple of lessons were learned.

Here's two things Day 8 taught us about the French Open, one from the men's side and one from the women's:

Being Seeded Higher Isn't Always Better

Roger Federer learned this lesson the hard way, finding himself in a wire-to-wire contest with No. 15-ranked Gilles Simon, who almost ended his preposterous nine-year streak of quarterfinals at Grand Slams.

Ultimately, Fed, as he always does, managed to come back and save the day, but it was hard not to feel bad for him. He worked hard to earn the second seed in this tournament, and the placement that comes with his ranking is supposed to be a reward, not a punishment.

But on Sunday, it turned out to be the latter. Because of how the draw played out in the rest of the field, Federer was the highest seed playing on Day 8, but also had the highest-seeded opponent among the favorites.

How did this happen, you ask? Let's take a closer look:

• (5) Tomas Berdych threw off the stasis early, losing a first-round match to Gael Monfils. That allowed (32) Tommy Robredo an unranked path to the fourth round, where he faced (11) Nicolas Almagro

• (23) Kevin Anderson upset (14) Milos Raonic in Round 3, setting up a match with (4) David Ferrer.

• (10) Marin Cilic was ousted by unranked Viktor Troicki, allowing Jo-Wilfred Tsonga to breeze into the quarterfinals against a much weaker opponent.

• (15) Gilles Simon took care of business on his end, winning a tough five-set match with (18) Sam Querry.

The result of that particular chain of events put Roger Federer in a tough spot, having the hardest go of any favorite in Day 8. And of all the players who came out victorious (shame on you Nicolas Almagro), he was the one who struggled to get there the most.

It doesn't get any fairer for Federer in the quarters either. He'll face (6) Jo-Wilfred Tsonga—another Frenchman who has always played him tough—while (4) David Ferrer, once again, gets a low-ranked opponent in Tommy Robredo.

Svetlana Kuznetsova's Comeback is For Real

Okay, so this is a lesson we already learned, but it never hurts to take a refresher course.

Svetlana Kuznetsova's fall from grace wasn't pretty, but it set her up for one of the most impressive comebacks of the past few years. The former World No. 2, a former French Open winner from 2009, lost in the first round of Wimbledon 2012 before withdrawing from the U.S. Open—the first Grand Slam she missed after 40 consecutive appearances.

She began her comeback in style earlier this year, upsetting former World No. 1 Caroline Wozniacki at the Apia International Sydney, then made the quarterfinals as an unseeded player at the Australian Open.

Now, unseeded once again at yet another Grand Slam tournament, Kuznetsova has once again reached the quarterfinals. And this time, she did so in dominant fashion.

She lost just one set in the run up to Sunday's fourth-round game, avenging the 1-6 loss with consecutive 6-2 wins right after. Then, Sunday, against (8) Angelique Kerber, Kuznetsova got the better of play for most of the afternoon, eventually going on to win and advance to her second straight Grand Slam quarterfinal.

Her magical ride could very well come to an end in her next match, a showdown with Serena Williams, who looks unstoppable herself at the present moment. But if nothing else, this run further increases the sample size in Kuznetsova's incredible comeback.

She's clearly one of the 10 best women's players going right now.