Barbora Krejcikova battles past Sofia Kenin in all-Grand Slam champion final in San Diego

In a hard-fought final between Grand Slam champions, 2021 Roland Garros champion Barbora Krejcikova outdid 2020 Australian Open winner Sofia Kenin for the WTA 500-level title in San Diego on Saturday evening, 6-4, 2-6, 6-4.

It was Krejcikova’s second WTA title of the year, after her triumph in Dubai in February, and the seventh WTA title of her career.

The No. 13-ranked Czech, a former No. 2, is projected to return to the Top 10 on Monday based on her results this week.

After coming through an opening set that saw five breaks of serve—three for her, two for Kenin—Krejcikova watched on as Kenin’s aggressive baseline game caught fire, the American breaking in the opening game of the second set and grabbing another break in the seventh game before serving it out.

The third set was a serving stand-off, with eight straight holds to start the set without even a single break point for either player, until Kenin brought up four break points with Krejcikova serving at 4-all—but the Czech saved them all, dug out the hold and snuck out one last break to close it out after two hours and 38 minutes.

Krejcikova finished the match with 48 winners to 40 unforced errors, while Kenin had an even 28 to 28 on the day.

The Czech won just three more points than Kenin, 105 to 102.

Shortly after the singles final, Krejcikova returned to the court for the doubles final with longtime partner Katerina Siniakova, and the two Czechs defeated Americans—and former Top 10 singles players—Danielle Collins and CoCo Vandeweghe, 6-1, 6-4.

Krejcikova and Siniakova now have 16 career WTA doubles titles together, including seven Grand Slam titles—two at the Australian Open, two at Roland Garros, two at Wimbledon and one at the US Open. They also captured the gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, as well as the WTA Finals title later that year.

This week was the second singles-doubles sweep of Krejcikova’s career at a tour-level event. Her first: Roland Garros in 2021.

She's also the first woman to sweep both the singles and doubles titles at an event at the WTA 500 level or higher this year—she's actually the first to do it since the very first week of the 2022 season, when Ashleigh Barty did it at the WTA 500 in Adelaide.