WATCH: Kyrgios wows in Citi Open first- round win

It can be kind of roll of the dice when Nick Kyrgios plays an opponent outside the Top 200, like qualifier and University of Virginia graduate Thai-Son Kwiatkowski, who was playing his first tour-level match of the year.

Kyrgios is equally likely to play an absolutely spectacular match or one he takes far too unseriously. Fortunately, fans got a bit of both in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday night, when he notched a competitive, yet explosive, 7-5, 6-4, win over the 2017 NCAA singles champion.

The Aussie tried everything early, and he often got burned, such as when he yelled to distract his opponent on a drop shot, which Kwiatkowski managed to retrieve—leaving sneaker skid marks en route to a crosscourt winner.

Kwiatkowski would get the better of Kyrgios again, at 3-3, when he'd block back a Kyrgios jumping tweener to win the point.

However, tennis' greatest showman would break to pull ahead in that same game, sneak-attacking a 132-mph first serve to take away Kwiatkowski's time:

Kyrgios' trick-shot game was fully flowing by the back end of the opening set, when he sucked Kwiatkowski into the court with a random tweener, then immediately finished the point with a backhand pass down the line.

And the crowd, clearly, was loving it.

After failing to serve out the set on the first try, Kyrgios broke back and then ran away with the match relatively quickly, ending it, 7-5, 6-4, over an hour and 32 minutes.

Kyrgios, who hasn't reached a quarterfinal since his Acapulco title early this year, faces No. 11 seed Gilles Simon on Wednesday, fourth on John Harris Court, where the crowd will eagerly wait to see what he does next.

Kwiatkowski, meanwhile, is projected to enter the Top 200 next week.