WHAT HAPPENED: Serena Williams earned her 10th trip to the US Open women’s singles final with a 6-3, 6-1 victory over No. 5 Elina Svitolina Thursday night in Arthur Ashe Stadium. The win gives Williams another chance to capture her 24th career Grand Slam women’s singles title, which would tie Margaret Court’s all-time record.
The match wasn’t nearly as easy as Williams’ 44-minute quarterfinals win over Qiang Wang. When this match hit the 44-minute mark, the first set had just ended. The first two games alone lasted 16 minutes. Svitolina had her chances, but Williams fought off six break points. Once Williams closed out the first set, she made quick work of the second to win her 101st career match victory at the US Open, tying Chris Evert's all-time record.
Things could have been very different from the start, as Svitolina had three break points in the first game. Williams stormed back to take a 1-0 lead, but then Svitolina, who was back in a Grand Slam semifinal after getting there at Wimbledon, quickly took a 40-love lead in her first service game. It looked like things would be even quickly. After Willams got it back to deuce, however, the two went back and forth for several minutes before Williams broke for a 2-0 edge.
“They were long,” Williams said of these first two games. “She’s such a good player, obviously. Two semis in a row is really impressive and really hard to do. I just wanted to not get off to a slow start and just try to hang in there.”
Williams won the next game at love to take a 3-0 lead. Svitolina held serve to get on the board and then once again had a triple break point on Williams. Down 30-40, Williams rushed the net—something she did more often in this match than most—and hit a winner for deuce. Two points later, a backhand slam gave Williams a 4-1 lead.
“Don’t expect that again,” Williams said after the match about her penchant for coming to the net. “That was like, ‘What am I doing at the net? Let me get back to the baseline.’”
But it worked. She had six net points in the first set and was 11 of 16 at the net overall. While the first set lasted 41 minutes, Williams needed less than half that time to dispose of Svitolina. The match was over in one hour and 10 minutes. Williams had six aces in the match, and 34 winners versus 20 unforced errors.
WHAT IT MEANS: There are so many numbers that speak to just how impressive Williams has been through the years. In addition to earning her 10th appearance in a US Open singles final, this will be her 33rd Grand Slam final overall. If she wins the title on Saturday, she will break two significant all-time records that she currently shares with Evert.
In addition to winning her 102nd US Open match if she defeats the winner of the Belinda Bencic versus Bianca Andreescu semifinal, it would also be Williams’ seventh US Open women’s singles crown. She and Evert share the mark with six.
“It’s just impressive,” Williams said, reflecting on the 101st win. “To be in any club with Chrissie is just awesome.”
MATCH POINT: After winning her 23rd career Grand Slam singles title at the 2017 Australian Open, this will be her fourth chance to tie Court’s record. She’s been to the finals at Wimbledon and the US Open this year and last. Will the fourth time be the charm?
