WHAT HAPPENED: The biggest players step up at the biggest moments. And on Thursday, in the biggest tennis stadium in the world, Serena Williams turned in a dominant performance full of power and poise to advance to the 2018 US Open women's final.
The six-time US Open women's singles champion defeated Anastasija Sevastova of Latvia, 6-3, 6-0, in the first of the evening's semifinals in Arthur Ashe Stadium, shaking off a slow start before storming through 12 of the final 13 games to reach her 31st major championship match.
"It's honestly really incredible," said Williams, who missed the 2017 US Open while pregnant with Alexis Olympia. "A year ago I was fighting for literally my life at the hospital after I had the baby. Every day I step on this court I'm so grateful that I have an opportunity to play this sport. No matter what happens in any match, semis, finals, I just feel like I've already won."
Williams, who has won 23 career Grand Slam singles titles, will play the winner of the Madison Keys-Naomi Osaka semifinal up next.
Sevastova broke Williams in the first game of the match before the American had zeroed in from the baseline. But once she did find her range, there was only going to be one outcome, Williams' relentless groundstrokes penetrating the stubborn Latvian's defense and her play at the net finishing off points at will.
Williams capitalized on her third break point to get back to 2-2 and she broke again in the sixth game to forge ahead, 4-2. An overhead smash consolidated the break for a fifth consecutive game, and even though Sevastova held for 5-3, Williams put a bow on the 40-minute set when Sevastova sprayed a forehand wide into the doubles alley.
"I couldn't have predicted this at all," Williamsa said. "Just been working really hard. Like I said, this is just the beginning of my return. I'm still on the way up. There's still much more that I plan on doing. You don't reach your best a couple months in. That's kind of where I am now. I just feel like there's a lot of growth to still go in my game. That's actually the most exciting part."
Sevastova, the first Latvian to ever reach a US Open semifinal, never capitalized on her early lead and she struggled to get into Williams' service games, especially when Williams pulled her off the court with wide serves on both the deuce and ad courts. The 28-year-old didn't appear to be overwhelmed by the occasion, but it quickly became evident that chipping the backhand and trying to bring Williams into the net with drop shots was never going to yield regular success.
As impressive as the 36-year-old was in closing out the opener, she was even more spectacular in the second, needing just 26 minutes in punching her ticket to the Saturday's final.
"Well, it was tough for sure," Sevastova said. "I think I had chances also in the first set, also in the second. But, yeah, how the first set went, I think it affected me in the second a little bit."
The No. 19 seed stuck to an approach that scarcely produced the results she was hoping for in the first set, and she immediately fell behind in the opening stages of the second set.
Poor drop shots in each of Sevastova's first two service games offered Williams the chance to forge ahead, and with the American up a double break at 3-0, it was clear that the Latvian had no answers to the questions Williams posed before a near-capacity crowd under the closed dome at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center.
Williams, who hit 31 winners and never faced a break point after her first service game, never took her foot off the accelerator. She remained white-hot from the baseline, turning 97-mph Sevastova serves around for clean winners and sending down first serves that reached 120-mph, just shy of her own tournament high (121 mph).
A forehand down the line quickly made it 5-0 as any pretense of a Sevastova rally was firmly shattered, and Williams, who dropped just two points on her first serve in the second set, served out her spot in the championship on her second match point.
"I'm still waiting to get to be the Serena that I was, and I don't know if I'll ever be that physically, emotionally, mentally," added Williams, who said she was 50 or 60 percent back to her pre-pregnancy form. "But I'm on my way. I feel like I still have a ways to go. Once I get there, I'll be able to play even hopefully better."
WHAT IT MEANS: Williams made the most of her ninth consecutive US Open semifinal with a vintage performance that echoed some of her greatest performances in the second week at Flushing Meadows.
The owner of 72 titles, Williams, who will climb to at least No. 16 in Monday's rankings, is now one win away from matching Margaret Court's all-time mark of 24 major titles, a record that has stood since 1973.
She's already the third-oldest Grand Slam women's singles finalist of the Open era at 36 years and 349 days old. Should she prevail on Saturday afternoon, she'll surpass her own record of oldest champion, set at the Australian Open in 2017.
MATCH POINT: A 16-time Grand Slam doubles champion and three-time Olympic doubles gold medalist, Williams is so dominant from the back of the court that people too easily forget her volleying and her ability at the net. But the American won 24 of 28 points when he she came forward against Sevastova, turning in a well-rounded performance that oozed dominance and confidence, two things the champion has always had an abundance of.
