Serena Williams Wins The U.S. Open

As day slipped into night in Flushing Meadows Sunday, the wind whipped and swirled inside Arthur Ashe Stadium, and seemed about to blow the dominant story line of the last two weeks into Flushing Bay.

Only then did the defending champion restore order, stilling her fraying nerves and unleashing the most powerful serve in women’s tennis, and achieving the pinnacle she was after.

Scarcely a half-hour before Serena Williams hoisted a Grand Slam trophy for the 17th time – earned with a taut 7-5, 6-7 (6), 6-1 victory over No. 2 Victoria Azarenka — she was kicking her racket, coming unglued, looking utterly disgusted that she couldn’t hold a two-break advantage in the second set, that she failed twice to serve things out for her title. Nobody said it was going to be easy.

“Vika is such a great opponent and great fighter,” Williams said. “It was never over until match point.”

The triumph for the 31-year-old Williams, the No. 1 player in the world, came in a rematch of last year’s final against Azarenka, a 24-year-old from Belarus , and did nothing but reaffirm her growing stature as perhaps the most dominant player ever.

Azarenka – two-time defending Australian Open champion — won 13 games off of a player who had lost only 16 games in steamrolling with ridiculous ease through six previous rounds, and belted enough blistering backhands and artful drop shots that she helped Williams make 35 unforced errors – almost triple her tournament average.

It just wasn’t enough.

“I lost to a great champion. I did everything I could,” said Azarenka.

A five-time Open champion who hauled in $3.6 million for this latest Slam, Williams captured her first Open title at age 17, in 1999. She looked to be headed inexorably to another relative drubbing when she went up two breaks, and 4-1, in the second, after weathering Azarenka’s clean and formidable first set.

Indeed, after Williams whacked a wicked backhand crosscourt winner, and Azarenka double-faulted twice to lose that fifth game of the second, you were almost ready to roll out the carpet for the trophy ceremony.

Except that Ararenka broke Williams at 30, and then held for 4-3 with a running forehand down the line that was one of the best shots of the 200-point match. Still, when Williams held at love, smoking a 119-mph ace en route, and served for the trophy at 5-4, a straight-set victory seemed assured.

And then things got interesting, Williams launching a couple of backhand approaches long, playing shakily, getting broken for 5-5. She broke back, but serving for the match again, double-faulted on break point to force the breaker, and when she overcooked another backhand to lose the breaker, she walked off disgustedly and fired her racket at her chair.

Williams, for the first time in a long while, looked vulnerable and the tension ratcheted up.

Somebody at courtside hollered out, “You’re still in charge, Serena.” The words turned out to be prescient.

Williams would lose just two points on her first serve (11 of 13, 85%) in the decisive set and took advantage of Azarenka’s wobbly forehand to break for 3-1, then held with her best service game of the match.

Pow, 124-mph ace.

Biff, 126-mph ace.

Bam, 102-mph ace.

It was 4-1 and after one more break at 30, the valiant Azarenka, who stands in and hits with Williams better than anybody, finally looked beaten.

“In that particular moment, she was tougher today,” Azarenka said.

Serena Williams is 67-4 for the year, 72-9 in her life at the U.S. Open, a defending champion in Flushing Meadows for the first time. Let the wind blow. Williams is unyielding, and has another trophy to prove it.

Give it up for Greatness!




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