Madison Keys wins Australian Open in Aryna Sabalenka upset

Madison Keys fulfilled her destiny at the 2025 Australian Open, stunning Aryna Sabalenka, 6-3, 2-6, 7-5 to capture the women’s singles title on Saturday.

Ten years after the No. 19 seed first reached the semifinals as a teenager, Keys capped a flawless start to her season with a maiden Grand Slam victory Down Under, denying the world No. 1 a third straight title after two hours and two minutes of hard-hitting tennis on Rod Laver Arena.

Sabalenka was looking to join the likes of Margaret Court, Evonne Goolagong, Stefanie Graf, Monica Seles, and Martina Hingis as the only women to three-peat in Melbourne, having won her first two majors at the Australian Open in 2023 and 2024. The 26-year-old ended 2024 by winning a first US Open title to sweep the season’s hard-court majors and ultimately wrest the WTA Year-End No. 1 ranking from rival Iga Swiatek.

Top seed at a major for the first time in her career, Sabalenka maintained a perfect start to 2025 by taking an 11-match winning streak into the final—starting the year with a title at the Brisbane International.

Dropping just one set to reach the championship match—in the quarterfinals against Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova—Sabalenka was the oddsmaker’s favorite to win another Australian Open title against Keys, whom she led 4-1 in their head-to-head.

But Keys, who has challenged Sabalenka in the past, most notably in a 2023 US Open semifinal where she led 6-0, 5-3 before falling in a final-set tiebreaker, is in the midst of a career renaissance after spending the off-season switching racquets and tweaking her already-formidable serve motion. The small improvements yielded a spectacular start to the new season, one that saw the recently-married American win a title of her own in Adelaide and reach her first Grand Slam final since the 2017 US Open. To get there, she scored an emotional victory over former world No. 1 Iga Swiatek, rallying from match point down to shock her longtime nemesis in the semifinals.

In her 46th major main-draw appearance, Keys met the challenge of facing the world’s Top 2 players in the biggest matches of her life with remarkable poise. As the championship match got underway, she broke Sabalenka twice to race ahead, 5-1, in the opening set.

Sabalenka, who has been 33-1 in Australia since the beginning of 2023, saved a set point to begin clawing her way into the match. Keys would take the set two games later with a backhand down the line, but Sabalenka began the second in much better stead, saving three break points to consolidate a 5-1, double-break advantage of her own.

Though Keys ended the run of five games against her, Sabalenka would not be denied a decider, serving the set out at the match’s 80-minute mark when the American erred long off the forehand side.

Keys dug out of a 0-30 deficit early in the third, and the pair traded strong service holds as the match reached its critical phase.

Serving to stay in the match at 5-6, Sabalenka netted a forehand as an inspired Keys earned a pair of championship points past the two-hour mark. Sabalenka saved one but Keys powered through the second, clinching victory with a searing forehand winner.