10 incredible things Aryna Sabalenka achieved by winning the Australian Open

Aryna Sabalenka took the Australian Open by storm this year, not dropping a set en route to the final and then winning a 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 slugfest against Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina for the title.

Here are 10 things the 24-year-old achieved in Melbourne:

First and foremost, she won her first Grand Slam title. With three prior semifinals at majors, four WTA 1000 titles and a career-high ranking of No. 2, she was at (or at least next to) the top of the list of best players yet to win one. Now, she’s taken her name off that list.

She finished the tournament with 247 winners to just 164 unforced errors—an incredible +83 differential. Fifty-one of those winners came against Rybakina in the two-hour, 28-minute final—an average of just over one winner every three minutes.

She’s now 11-0 in 2023. She went 4-0 en route to winning the WTA 500 lead-up event in Adelaide, which was actually her first title in 20 months, and 7-0 en route to winning the Australian Open.

By winning the first 10 of those 11 matches in straight sets, she became just the third woman this century to win their first 10 tour-level matches of the season without dropping a set. The other two: Agnieszka Radwanska (2013) and Anna Smashnova (2002).

She’s now back at her career-high of No. 2. She spent over six months at No. 2, 27 weeks to be exact, between August 23, 2021 and February 28, 2022. She fell from that spot, but she never left the No. 3-7 range—and this week she’s back at No. 2 for a 28th career week.

She’s now won 27 of her last 32 matches at Grand Slams. Going into Wimbledon in 2021, she was 16-14 in 14 career majors played—since then, she’s 27-5 in the last six Grand Slams she's played.

With her 6-3, 6-2 quarterfinal victory over Donna Vekic, she improved to 4-0 in her career in Grand Slam quarterfinals. She’s just the sixth woman in the Open Era to win their first four major quarterfinals, after Ann Jones (who won her first six), Billie Jean King (who won her first four), Chris Evert (who won her first 48—yes, 48) and Elena Dementieva and Naomi Osaka (who won their first four).

She’s now 7-0 from a set down at majors since the start of 2022. Winning the first set against Sabalenka at a major has not been a good thing lately—among her victims in that run have been Marketa Vondrousova, Kaia Kanepi, Danielle Collins and now Rybakina.

She’s done a complete 180 on her serve since a year ago. Last year, Sabalenka left the Australian Open with a year-to-date average of 5.5 aces to 15.8 double faults a match—this year, she leaves with a year-to-date average of 7.4 aces to 4.6 double faults a match.

She’s just the fourth woman since 1980 to have won the Australian Open in both singles and doubles in their career. Sabalenka won the doubles in 2021 (with Elise Mertens) and now the singles in 2023. The other three women to do it since 1980 are pretty good company: Martina Navratilova, Martina Hingis and Serena Williams.