Mirjana Lucic-Baroni is playing the best tennis of her career at age 35, reaching the Australian Open semifinals, establishing a new career-best ranking and upsetting No. 5 seed Agnieszka Radwanksa on Saturday to reach the round of 16 at the Miami Open.
Here’s a little more on this former junior phenom from Croatia:
The Mirjana Lucic-Baroni File
Age: 35
Height: 5-11
Residence: Sarasota, FL
Represents: Croatia
Current Rank: 29
Career-High Rank: 29 (March 2017)
Best US Open Finish: 4R (2014)
The Baseline
- Lucic-Baroni owns one of the most fascinating biographies in tennis. She was a junior star, winning the 1996 US Open girls’ singles title. She also captured the 1998 Australian Open doubles title (with Martina Hingis) and reached the singles semifinals at Wimbledon in 1999 to climb to No. 32 in the world. But her career stalled after that. She and her family fled what she said was an abusive father, coming to the U.S. in the late 1990s, and Lucic-Baroni took a hiatus from the game from 2004 to 2006 – playing just two tournaments during that three-year span – before launching a comeback on the USTA Pro Circuit.
- She returned full-time to the tour in March 2007, winning her opening-round match in Indian Wells for her first WTA main-draw victory since the 2002 French Open. She would climb back into the Top 300 in 2009 and ascend to a season-ending No. 105 in 2010, when she won titles at the USTA Pro Circuit events in Albuquerque, N.M., and Jackson, Miss.
- The big breakthrough of her second act came at the 2014 US Open, where she upset rising star Garbiñe Muguruza and No. 2 seed Simona Halep to reach the fourth round – her best Grand Slam result since 1999 Wimbledon. Later that month, she won Quebec City for her first WTA title since Bol in 1998.
- Lucic-Baroni achieved another career milestone at the 2017 Australian Open, defeating No. 3 seed Radwanska and No. 5 Karolina Pliskova to reach the semifinals. This past week she topped Radwanska again to pull into the round of 16 in Miami. (She plays American Bethanie Mattek-Sands Monday for a spot in the quarters.)
- Thanks to her recent run, Lucic-Baroni has improved from No. 81 in the world at season-end 2016 to No. 29 in the latest rankings. She is No. 10 in the Race to Singapore, which measures the players who have earned the most ranking points in this calendar year.
They Said It!
“I know this means a lot to every player to reach the semifinals, but to me this is overwhelming. I will never ever, ever forget this day or the last couple of weeks. This has truly made my life, and everything bad that happened, it has made it OK. Just the fact that I was this strong and that it was worth fighting for, it’s really incredible.” – an emotional Lucic-Baroni, after reaching the semifinals of the 2017 Australian Open, her first major semifinal in 18 years
