Rybakina routs Swiatek 6-2, 6-2 to reach Indian Wells final

Associated PressMar 18, 2023, 1:06 PM EDT

Desert Sun

INDIAN WELLS, Calif. – Elena Rybakina fired seven aces in routing top-ranked Iga Swiatek 6-2, 6-2 to advance to the BNP Paribas Open final.

“I’m pretty sad that I lost,” Swiatek said.

Rybakina will play second-seeded Aryna Sabalenka, who beat Maria Sakkari 6-2, 6-3, in Sunday’s final in the Southern California desert.

“It’s going to be huge,” said Sabalenka, who won the doubles title in 2019. “This tournament feels like a Grand Slam. I really want to hold this trophy as a singles champion.”

Rybakina needed just 76 minutes to finish off Swiatek, the defending champion. She won 82% of her first-serve points, while Swiatek only managed 42%. Rybakina also beat the Polish star at the Australian Open in January on her way to finishing runner-up.

“I didn’t expect that I was going to play that good today,” Rybakina said. “I had nothing to lose, I just wanted to come and enjoy. I played one of the best matches this year.”

Swiatek had won 10 straight matches in the desert until being stopped by Rybakina’s powerful groundstrokes that repeatedly rushed Swiatek and forced her into uncharacteristic errors.

Swiatek double-faulted to lose the first set. Then she fell behind 5-0 in the second before rallying to win two games.

“I feel like I can play great tennis even against players who are serving pretty fast and everything,” she said. “But for sure the last couple of matches against Elena, they weren’t perfect for me.”

Swiatek said her rib was bothering her during the match.

“I still have to run some tests and see what’s going on. I don’t know yet,” she said, adding that for now she plans to play next week in Miami.

Sabalenka, the Australian Open champion, improved to 17-1 this year.

She leads Rybakina 4-0 in their career meetings, but all four have gone to a deciding set, including in the final Down Under.

“It was a really close match in Australia,” Rybakina said on court. “If I’m going to play like I did today, I think I have all the chances.”

Sabalenka took control against Sakkari, seeded seventh, from the start. She attacked the Greek’s second serve, winning 20 of 26 points off it. Sakkari, runner-up in last year’s final, fell to 3-5 in her career against Sabalenka.

Sakkari reached the semifinals by rallying from a set down three times and going 4-0 in deciding sets.

But Sabalenka was too dominant. She won the final three games, including two service breaks, to take the first set, 6-2.

Sabalenka led 2-0 in the second before Sakkari tied it 2-all. From there, Sabalenka won four of the final five games to close out the match in 1 1/2 hours.

“Just super happy right now,” Sabalenka said on court. “Maria’s such a great player and I knew it was going to be tough.”

Martina Navratilova says doctors told her she is cancer-free

Associated PressMar 21, 2023, 10:53 AM EDT

Susan Mullane-USA TODAY Sports

LONDON — Martina Navratilova returned to TV work at Tennis Channel for its coverage of the Miami Open, less than three months after saying she had throat cancer and breast cancer.

“It’s great to be back. … Thrilled to be here,” said the 18-time Grand Slam singles champion and member of the International Tennis Hall of Fame. “So happy to be working. How many people can say that?”

The 66-year-old Navratilova said her sense of taste disappeared during the treatment for cancer and she lost 15 pounds. She did not appear on television during the Australian Open in January or the BNP Paribas Open this month.

“It puts you face-to-face with your mortality, No. 1, because at the beginning, I wasn’t sure if it was treatable, so that was hard,” she said. “But once I got into the program, it was a little easier emotionally, but more difficult physically. … But I’m still standing.”

In an interview with Piers Morgan on TalkTV scheduled to air Tuesday, Navratilova said she has been told by doctors that, “as far as they know, I’m cancer-free,” and that she should be “good to go” after some additional radiation treatment.

According to The Sun newspaper, Navratilova also told Morgan that when she was diagnosed, “I was in a total panic for three days, thinking I may not see next Christmas” and came up with a bucket list of things she wanted to do.

She noticed an enlarged lymph node in her neck while attending the season-ending WTA Finals in Fort Worth, Texas, in November, and a biopsy showed early stage throat cancer. While Navratilova was undergoing tests on her throat, she said, the unrelated, early stage breast cancer was discovered.

Navratilova was diagnosed with a noninvasive form of breast cancer in 2010 and had a lumpectomy.

She won 59 Grand Slam titles overall, including 31 in women’s doubles and 10 in mixed doubles. The last was a mixed doubles championship with Bob Bryan at the 2006 U.S. Open, a month shy of her 50th birthday.

Navratilova originally retired in 1994, after a record 167 singles titles and 331 weeks at No. 1 in the WTA rankings. She returned to the tour to play doubles in 2000 and occasionally competed in singles, too.

Alcaraz wins Indian Wells over Medvedev, regains No. 1 rank

Associated PressMar 20, 2023, 1:00 AM EDT

Julian Finney/Getty Images

INDIAN WELLS, Calif. – Carlos Alcaraz defeated Daniil Medvedev 6-3, 6-2 to win the BNP Paribas Open title and regain the world’s No. 1 ranking.

The 19-year-old Spaniard will move from second to first in the ATP Tour rankings on Monday, displacing Novak Djokovic. The Serb withdrew from Indian Wells before the tournament began when he couldn’t gain entry to the U.S. because he’s unvaccinated for COVID-19.

“For me, it’s a dream come true again,” Alcaraz said. “Obviously being in front of such great players like Novak, it’s an amazing feeling.”

“I would say this has been the perfect tournament,” he said.

In the women’s final, Elena Rybakina beat Aryna Sabalenka 7-6 (11), 6-4 and handed the world’s second-ranked player just her second loss this year.

Last year, Alcaraz became the youngest man to reach No. 1 in ATP history after his title at the U.S. Open.

He achieved another mark in the third round at Indian Wells. That’s when Alcaraz notched his 100th career match victory, the second-quickest player behind John McEnroe to do so.

Alcaraz also became the first man to win the tournament without dropping a set since Roger Federer in 2017 and the youngest man to win the title in the desert.

“I really trust in every shot that I hit,” he said. “If I miss, I don’t mind.”

Alcaraz hit 19 winners and had 10 unforced errors while keeping Medvedev off-balance with a steady array of serve-and-volley and drop shots. The teenager never faced a break point while opening leads of 3-0 in the first set and 4-0 in the second.

“What I improve a lot is to don’t take the pressure, just to play relaxed,” Alcaraz said. “That’s why I show a great level, because I feel like I have no pressure. I enjoy. I’m playing relaxed.”

Medvedev’s 19-match winning streak ended. It went back to his title run in Rotterdam in February. He then won tournaments in Doha and Dubai.

“I want to congratulate you for the work you have done in the last few months,” Alcaraz told his opponent. “Winning three titles in a row and reaching the finals here is an amazing achievement.”

Alcaraz and Rybakina earned $1,262,220 each for their wins.

Rybakina carried the momentum from her straight-set semifinal upset of top-ranked Iga Swiatek into the final and beat Sabalenka for the first time in five career meetings.

For the first time in their budding rivalry, the match didn’t go three sets. Sabalenka went the distance to beat Rybakina in the Australian Open final in January. In that match, Sabalenka fired 17 aces and rallied from a set down to win her first Grand Slam title.

This time, the 10th-seeded Rybakina had seven aces and No. 2 seed Sabalenka committed 10 double faults. Sabalenka won just 11 of 35 second-serve points.

“I would say that I was super disappointed with my serve, so I was back to old habits,” she said. “I was like a little bit overreacting on things, and I wasn’t there in the first two games in the second set.”

Rybakina broke for leads of 2-0 and 5-2 in the second set before Sabalenka closed to 5-4. But Rybakina served out the victory in just over two hours.

“This tiebreak was really epic, I would say, with all these double faults and nerves,” Rybakina said. “In the end, it was just focusing on every point and try to fight till the end.”

Rybakina improved her match record to 16-4 this year; Sabalenka fell to 17-2.

“This tough loss will motivate me more because I don’t like to lose in the finals,” Sabalenka said. “This is the worst.”

During the victory ceremony, Rybakina, the current Wimbledon champion, told the crowd it was the first time she’d beaten Sabalenka.

Sabalenka stepped forward, took the mic and said, “I will make sure it was the last one.”

Then she smiled.