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Marta Kostyuk walked off the Caja Mágica on Saturday as the last person standing, and she did it in the most fitting way possible: by out-competing someone she had every reason not to face at all.
Kostyuk defeated Mirra Andreeva in the final, 6-3, 7-5, to claim her first WTA 1000 title and third WTA Tour title overall. It was a clean, composed performance from the Ukrainian. There was no drama, no wobble, just controlled aggression on a surface that has started to suit her more and more. Andreeva, who has been one of the most consistent players on tour this season, simply couldn’t find the answers on the day.
But the result at the top was almost secondary to what happened in the rounds before it.
The Baptiste Bulletin
If you watched the second week in Madrid and came away talking about anyone other than Hailey Baptiste, you weren’t paying attention. The 24-year-old from Washington, D.C. reached a maiden WTA 1000 semifinal by navigating a tricky draw and some incredible ups and downs. The sequence of matches she put together was, frankly, absurd.
In her second match, Baptiste took on ninth-ranked Jasmine Paolini and unleashed 14 aces on her way to a straight-sets win — just the third top-10 victory of her career. Then came the match that probably should have ended her run. In the round of 16, Baptiste served for a straight-sets win against Belinda Bencic, but ultimately dropped a 95-minute second set by losing a tiebreak 16-14, with Bencic saving six match points in the process.
If I were in her shoes, I either would’ve retired or likely lost the third set, 6-0. But Baptiste won in three sets. Then, she beat Aryna Sabalenka.
Sabalenka, the defending champion, lost in the quarterfinals to Baptiste in a result that sent shockwaves through the draw and had real implications at the top of the rankings. Baptiste walks away with a career-high ranking of 25 in the world. Her run was eventually ended by Andreeva in the semis, but the scoreline doesn’t really matter. Baptiste announced herself at this level, and it wasn’t a fluke. She has an all-court style that can tussle with anyone, anywhere.
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The Lucky Loser Who Made History
Not to be buried in the Baptiste noise: Anastasia Potapova became the first lucky loser to reach a WTA 1000 or Tier I semifinal in the format’s history since 1990. That’s not a minor footnote, but a piece of trivia that will live in tennis record books. She lost to Andreeva in the final four, but the fact that she got there at all is remarkable.
The Rankings Picture
The fallout from Sabalenka’s early exit will be felt through the rest of the clay swing. Sabalenka began the tournament ranked No. 1 with a 2,395-point cushion over second-ranked Elena Rybakina. That gap has since narrowed to 1,555 points. It still looks comfortable on paper, but Sabalenka has a Rome quarterfinal and a Roland Garros final to defend over the coming weeks, while Rybakina has a title defense in Strasbourg and fourth-round points to protect in Paris. The math could get interesting.
On to Rome
The Internazionali BNL d’Italia gets underway this week at the Foro Italico in Rome, running through May 17 in its 83rd edition as a WTA 1000 event.
Last year’s event was a fairytale story, with Jasmine Paolini claiming the title on home soil and becoming the first Italian woman to win in Rome since 1985. Paolini returns to defend, but comes in seeded ninth, with Sabalenka leading the draw.
Kostyuk will see for her name in the draw as a freshly minted WTA 1000 champion seeded 23rd. Baptiste, now seeded 32nd, gets her first crack at a tournament where her serve-heavy game could cause chaos on a slower Roman surface. Andreeva, seeded eighth, will want to show that Saturday’s final was a stumble, not a ceiling.
Coco Gauff and Iga Świątek, seeded third and fourth respectively, both have significant points to defend, which adds pressure to two players who have been inconsistent outside the big moments this season.
Rome is always one of the most unpredictable tournaments on the calendar. The draw is deep, the conditions are tricky, and the crowd makes the Foro Italico feel like nowhere else in tennis. With Roland Garros less than three weeks away, every match carries weight.
How will things unfold? Well, to me:
Round of 16
(1) Aryna Sabalenka def. (13) Linda Nosková
(12) Belinda Bencic def. (6) Amanda Anisimova
(3) Coco Gauff def. (16) Iva Jovic
(8) Mirra Andreeva def. (9) Jasmine Paolini
(5) Jessica Pegula def. (11) Karolina Muchová
(4) Iga Świątek def. (19) Diana Shnaider
(7) Elina Svitolina def. (17) Madison Keys
(2) Elena Rybakina def. (23) Marta Kostyuk
Quarterfinals
(1) Aryna Sabalenka def. (12) Belinda Bencic
(3) Coco Gauff def. (8) Mirra Andreeva
(4) Iga Świątek def. (5) Jessica Pegula
(2) Elena Rybakina def. (7) Elina Svitolina
Semifinals
(1) Aryna Sabalenka def. (3) Coco Gauff
(2) Elena Rybakina def. (4) Iga Świątek
Final
(1) Aryna Sabalenka def. (2) Elena Rybakina
Qualifiers haven’t been placed yet, so like I always say, take this with a grain of salt.
On to links!
This Week in Women’s Tennis
WTA tennis will be returning to Athens, Greece later this summer with the WTA 250 Athens Open coming in July.
While Marta Kostyuk has found the mindset to reach new career heights, Taylor Townsend and Katerina Siniaková continue to dominate by adding the Madrid doubles title to their haul.
Tennis was represented at last night’s Met Gala with Serena Williams and Naomi Osaka joining 2026 co-chair Venus Williams.
Former U.S. Open semifinalist Anastasija Sevastova announced her retirement, peaking at No. 11 in the WTA singles rankings:
Former Top 100 player Aliona Bolsova also bid farewell to tennis following a loss at the WTA 125 in La Bisbal d’Empordà:
Roland Garros qualifying begins in two weeks and former World No. 1 Karolina Plíšková and former U.S. Open champions Bianca Andreescu and Sloane Stephens headline the field.
Carson Branstine got tennis fans riled up in a TikTok that blasted the tasks the majority of the tennis tour faces such as traveling on Christmas, touring without a coach and the flawed doping system.
We’re not halfway through the 2026 season and Jacqueline Christian should be called Houdini after leading the tour with wins from match point down.
Reese Brantmeier and Maya Joint’s lawsuit against the NCAA was settled and prospective high school students can now keep whatever money they make in professional tournaments pre-enrollment. The $10,000-per year limit while in school still remains, for now.
With Ons Jabeur’s coach Issam Jellali in her corner, Zeynep Sönmez is confident that she’s just beginning her ascent up the rankings.
For players at the W100 event in Bonita Beach, it’s a way to continue camaraderie and also find family on the road.
Oura has joined the tennis world, becoming the official wearable of the U.S. Open.
We’ll delve into how the NCAA tournament unfolded later, but another Division I tennis program has been cut. The loss of the University of North Dakota’s team adds to the tension college tennis is facing.
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Tweet of the Week
Lulu Sun killed this voiceover with a BTS look at the Mutua Madrid Open:
Five at The IX: Madrid Week 2
Q. You mentioned on court about kind of it’s taken a long time to get to this point. I know it’s probably a long story, but could you kind of reflect on you when you were 15 and you break through, what that journey has been like, and what the challenges were to reach this point.
MARTA KOSTYUK: I’m going to try to make this story short. I think in the beginning of this year I told my team that I finally feel that the achievements that I had when I was 15 years old are not, how do you call it, it doesn’t have a weight on me anymore. Because I was living for many years in that state of everyone expecting big results from me. Like, almost winning, you know, having such good results being so young was almost like a curse.
I think when I freed myself from that actually it’s incredible. I’m very proud of myself that I managed to achieve all of that when I was 14 and 15 years old. It definitely gave me just the freedom to enjoy this sport and just play it. Yeah, it’s incredibly long journey, especially with the road that I took. I was growing up being coached by my mom. It’s never easy to go out of this relationship and to be able to do that, you know, having my mom as the closest person in my life. I always call her when I need support or when I just want to talk to her. I actually had a short training camp with her before clay court season, so I definitely should thank her for all the wins that I’ve had in the past month.
Yeah, I know a lot of difficult stories when parents are coaching their kids. But I’m happy I got out on the other side better, a better person, better player. It definitely took a lot of struggling and a lot of difficult moments.
For me, you know, almost nothing changes. I’m a Masters champion right now, but, you know, I want to just keep doing the same thing and keep working and keep enjoying this journey. It’s about the journey, it’s not about destination.
Q. I want to know if you were happy during the match with your performance, are you happy now? And what made, what do you think made the difference today, if it was something about her level, or something with your mentality or your level.
MIRRA ANDREEVA: Well, I was happy about how I played at certain moments. Obviously when you lose, for me personally, I cannot be happy. Obviously I can think of some of the things or some of the parts of the match where I thought that I would play well. To win you have to play like this the whole match and be consistent.
So I cannot say that I’m super happy, or just even happy right now. Obviously, I mean, she played well as well. She had a lot of winners. She tried to go for her shots, she played very aggressive. At some points I’ve been trying to, you know, just kind of pressure her and be aggressive as well. At some points I felt like I was winning more points where I would just try to put the ball back in the court and build the point slowly, and kind of get her tired.
But anyway, none of that worked super well because obviously I didn’t win in the end. Also, I mean, she played well. So the combination of all of those things I guess made the outcome.
Q. I know you talked about this a bit, but I’m curious what was your reaction I guess emotionally after you lost in qualifying? I imagine that was a match you thought you should be winning. So how did you react to this, and how did you get your head ready for the first round?
ANASTASIA POTAPOVA: Well, I had pretty tough week coming to play in Madrid. I cannot say I was fully ready. I didn’t have the proper recovery days because I didn’t have time for it after Linz.
Also, it was a little bit unfortunate in the second round of the qualifying, the weather, just everything around what’s going on this match just didn’t help me.
I just let it go. I had beautiful two days off in Madrid. I love Spain. I had good food, my family was here. I was really enjoying it. To be honest, I didn’t expect myself being in the draw again because at first they didn’t take my name as a lucky loser. And then the days kept on going and nobody were injured or pulling out. Then the last moment I got the information, literally 30 minutes before the match, that I was given a chance to step on court here again.
I cannot say that I was preparing for something, I was not at all. But I was trying just to recover and to have some nice days. But maybe that’s the key, you don’t need to be always so zoomed in and so locked in on the tournament. Maybe it’s just a matter of sometimes just to enjoy yourself and enjoy the journey, and maybe that’s how the results can also come.
Q. I wanted to ask about saving all of the match points. How did you get through that mentally, and just what was going through your head when it just kept repeating during that game, and then getting it done ultimately at the tiebreak?
HAILEY BAPTISTE: I mean, just to play one more point, make one more ball, and make sure that I’m making her earn that point. If she was going to win it, she was going to have to earn it. I knew that she obviously was feeling a little nervous too. She made a few unforced errors, which is normal. I wanted to make sure that I was very solid and, yeah, just really had the mindset of making her earn those points.
Q. I know you played her recently in Miami, obviously different surface. Curious, based off her performance today, what do you think maybe she did differently that made her game a little bit stronger today versus Miami?
ARYNA SABALENKA: I feel like in Miami I didn’t give her much opportunities. She couldn’t break my serve, I believe. Here, the first game, second set, I just double faulted twice out of nowhere. It felt like that gave her belief. After that, she just started playing more aggressively. She, as I said, she was playing brave tennis. What can I say? Well done.
Mondays: Soccer
By: Annie Peterson, @AnnieMPeterson, AP Women’s Soccer
Tuesdays: Tennis
By: Joey Dillon, @JoeyDillon, Freelance Tennis Writer
Wednesdays: Basketball
By: Howard Megdal, @HowardMegdal, The IX Sports
Thursdays: Golf
By: Marin Dremock, @MDremock, The IX Sports
Fridays: Hockey
By: @TheIceGarden, The Ice Garden
Saturdays: Gymnastics
By: Jessica Taylor Price, @jesstaylorprice, Freelance Writer