Serena Williams
After three unsuccessful attempts at her 22nd major, Serena found the formula: Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the very, very good. In the second round, she smashed a racquet and sent it spinning into a photographer’s lap. After that close call, though, Serena played the calmest and most calculated tennis I’ve seen from her in a year. In three of her last four matches, her opponents made inroads against her, but she just went about her business: i.e., coming up with bomb serves when she needed them. With Serena, it’s the inner battle that matters more than the outer one; knowing you should win every match doesn’t make it any easier to actually do it. Once again, at a time when some of us wondered if she had lost her edge in that battle, Serena found it again. “I know, mentally, no one can break me,” she said after beating McHale. Then she proved it. A+
Andy Murray
Roger Federer had his Fernando Gonzalez final; Djokovic had one against Jo-Wilfried Tsonga; Rafael Nadal won his first major over Mariano Puerta: It’s about time that Murray, after facing either Federer or Djokovic in his first 10 Grand Slam finals, had a chance to face a rookie. Finally we got to see a showcase for Murray’s game alone, without anyone else from the Big Four there to overshadow him. He made the most of it. His fast feet, his quick hands, his uncanny returns, his solid serve, his all-around subtlety and versatility, and his underappreciated cool under pressure: Murray proved himself a champion in his own right. He said his coach, Ivan Lendl, helped, but this win wasn’t about the “Lendl effect." Coming into the tournament, he had beaten his final four opponents—Nick Kyrgios, Tsonga, Tomas Berdych and Milos Raonic—in 24 of their last 25 meetings combined. This win was about Murray’s consistent excellence finally getting its just reward. “I feel like my best tennis is ahead of me,” he said afterward. Murray is 29, but you can understand why he feels that way. A+
Milos Raonic
His lack of consistency from the ground, and especially on the return, was thoroughly exposed by Murray, but his loss in the final wasn’t a surprise or a serious disappointment. The Raonic “brand,” as one reporter put it at Wimbledon, is about methodical, step-by-step progress. Everything he does on a tennis court, with the possible exception of his serve, looks learned rather than natural. Over the years, he has had to learn to run faster, make more returns and close out points at the net. In his first Grand Slam semi, Raonic lost in straight sets; in his second, he lost in five sets; in his third, against Federer on Friday, he broke through. Now, when it comes to Slam finals, the process may have started all over again. A major title isn’t guaranteed for the 25-year-old—he’ll likely always have exploitable weaknesses—but his effort to make it happen is. A