@TennisPublisher

April 8 marks the anniversary of the press conference where Arthur Ashe announced that he had AIDS. The monumental event is documented in my book “On This Day In Tennis History” which you can read below, but is personally narrated in the upcoming autobiography by Ashe’s great friend Charlie Pasarell called “Serving First: Dreams Realized and Lessons Learned from Family, Friends and a Life in Tennis that is available for pre-order here https://a.co/d/00Vb2ccU

Pasarell and Ashe were teammates and roommates at UCLA and on the U.S. Davis Cup team in the 1960s and shared both a competitive rivalry and a deep mutual respect and friendship that reflected a pivotal era in tennis history. Beyond the court, both men were influential voices in shaping modern tennis—Ashe through his advocacy for civil rights and equality, and Pasarell through his role in helping founding the Indian Wells Masters and helping grow the professional tour with Ashe and their fellow professionals.

In “Serving First,” Pasarell dives deep into his life and times with Ashe and provides a background and commentary on Ashe’s announcement of his diagnosis of AIDS, that he contracted via a blood transfusion. In describing the emotional press conference in New York City on April 8, 1992, Pasarell described the wrenching end of Ashe’s statement to the media when he discussed his daughter Camera and wife Jeanne.

Wrote Pasarell in “Serving First,” “But as Arthur mentioned Jeanne and Camera, he was so taken by emotion that he couldn’t continue. That was one of the few times I’d ever seen Arthur break down. Jeanne, who was standing by his side, read the rest of the statement. As I tell what happened next, I can’t help but burst into tears. There was dead silence. No one said anything. People were crying. At last, there came a few questions, which Arthur answered with his customary grace. “I wouldn’t use the word tragedy,” said Arthur. “I would use personal crisis and I’ve been through so many that this is just another.”   

The full summary of the April 8 Ashe press conference is detailed, as mentioned, below

1992 – Arthur Ashe holds an emotional press conference in New York to announce that he has contracted AIDS from heart surgery. Ashe, who had known he had the deadly disease for three years, said he decided to disclose the illness publicly only after learning that USA Today was preparing an article on his condition. Says the 48-year-old Ashe in his prepared statement, “Beginning with my admittance to New York Hospital for brain surgery in September 1988, some of you heard that I had tested positive for H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS. That is indeed the case.” Ashe says that he believed the virus was transmitted through a blood transfusion after heart surgery in 1983. Ashe states that he did not previously disclose his condition publicly to protect his privacy. Says Ashe, “Just as I’m sure everyone in this room has some personal matter he or she would like to keep private, so did we. There was certainly no compelling medical or physical necessity to go public with my medical condition.”

In Serving First, Pasarell shares a deeply human collection of stories about the people who shaped him— his tennis-champion parents; lifelong friends like Arthur Ashe; and legends like Pancho Gonzalez, who mentored Pasarell and later faced him in a five-hour Wimbledon epic. The 1967 U.S. No. 1, NCAA champion, and a five-time Davis Cup team member, Pasarell also co-founded the ATP, launched the National Junior Tennis League, and built the tennis tournament in Indian Wells into one of the sport’ s biggest events. But this memoir is about far more than stats or titles. It’ s a story of character, purpose, and moments that leave a mark— from traveling to Vietnam during the war to time spent with Robert F. Kennedy. Woven throughout are the words of wisdom from his father and Pasarell’ s lessons from a life grounded in love— for family, friendship, and the game that gave it all meaning.

The post “I Can’t Help But Burst Into Tears” – Charlie Pasarell Reflecting On Arthur Ashe AIDS Announcement Press Conference appeared first on World Tennis Magazine.

The SoCal Pro Series features seven straight weeks of men’s and women’s tournaments at premier tennis facilities across Southern California. Each $15,000-purse event is part of the USTA Pro Circuit and ITF World Tennis Tour. The series spans Los Angeles, Orange, and San Diego counties and makes its Inland Empire debut this year in Claremont.

The 2026 SoCal Pro Series’ tournament dates and locations are:

• May 25-31 – Lakewood Tennis Center, Lakewood
• June 1-7 – Lakewood Tennis Center, Lakewood
• June 8-14 – Jack Kramer Club, Rolling Hills Estates
• June 15-21 – Racquet Club of Irvine, Irvine
• June 22-28 – Biszantz Family Tennis Center, Claremont
• June 29-July 5 – Barnes Tennis Center, San Diego
• July 6-12 – Rancho Santa Fe Tennis Club, Rancho Santa Fe

“The SoCal Pro Series has always been about giving our junior and college players a real opportunity to test themselves,” said Trevor Kronemann, USTA Southern California Executive Director. “What’s been exciting to see is how they’re not just stepping into bigger events, they’re springboarding into them. They’re building belief, earning points, and proving they belong on the ATP and WTA tours. Having seven straight weeks of competition back on our calendar is huge for our section and for the players chasing that next level.”

Through the first four years of the SoCal Pro Series, 36 women and 21 men—who are either Southern California residents or played collegiate tennis in Southern California— have earned their first WTA/ATP world ranking point through the circuit, including seven women and five men in 2025.

Notable alumni who have used the series to catapult onto the professional tour include:

• Learner Tien (Irvine): Current ATP No. 22; 2026 Australian Open Quarterfinalist.
• Alex Michelsen (Aliso Viejo): Current ATP No. 35.
• Iva Jovic (Torrance): Current WTA No. 16; 2026 Australian Open Quarterfinalist.
• Local Standouts: Zach Svajda (Pacific Beach): Current ATP No. 84; Tristan Boyer (Altadena): Current ATP No. 242; Brandon Holt (Rolling Hills Estates): Current ATP No. 252; Julieta Pareja (Carlsbad): Current WTA No. 368; and Katherine Hui (San Diego): 2023 US Open Girls’ Singles Champion.

“The SoCal Pro Series was vital for my transition to the pro tour,” explained Jovic. “It was my first professional event [in 2022] and a great starting point. I really appreciate USTA SoCal’s commitment to giving wildcards and opportunities to local kids. SoCal has a great tennis community, with talented players and coaches, and that level of guidance and professionalism is incredible. Having professional events in our section—and a whole series of them—is something many other sections don’t have. It’s a huge advantage and exposure for SoCal kids.”

SoCal Pro Series’ main draw and qualifying wildcards are available to U.S. citizens who are either legal Southern California residents or full-time college students in the region.

Southern California players can register to play in pre-qualifying events for a chance to earn their way into the main draw as wild cards. The upcoming pre-qualifying schedule includes: May 9-11, Jack Kramer Club; May 15-19, Lakewood Tennis Center; May 22-24, Rancho Santa Fe Tennis Club; May 29-June 2, Racquet Club of Irvine; June 6-8, Barnes Tennis Center; June 12-14 The Claremont Club. SoCal players can register for pre-qualifying events at: https://ustasocal.com/proseries/#pre-qualifying.

To learn more about the SoCal Pro Series, go to: https://www.ustasocal.com/proseries. Follow along on Instagram: www.instagram.com/socalproseries;

Like the Facebook page at www.facebook.com/SoCalProSeries.

About USTA Southern California

USTA Southern California is one of 17 sections of the United States Tennis Association, the sport’s national governing body. From grassroots to adult leagues and junior tournaments to the pro tour, USTA SoCal is proud to live the mission of growing tennis to inspire healthier people and communities everywhere with its core values of community, inclusion, and wellness. From the Central Coast to San Diego and the Inland Empire to the Pacific Ocean, over 2.6 million people played tennis in Southern California in 2025. USTA SoCal, a 501(c)(3), is committed to promoting the game of tennis by offering quality recreational and competitive programs for people of all ages and abilities. To learn more, visit ustasocal.com and follow @ustasocal on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, X, YouTube, TikTok, and Threads.

The post SoCal Pro Series Returns For Fifth Season – Providing Critical Pathway For California’s Best Junior, Collegiate Talent appeared first on World Tennis Magazine.

March was a busy month for tennis’ leading-edge instructional publication, tennisplayer.net.  In addition to creating a new issue, the magazine’s publisher, Matt Pressman, and executive editor, Joel Drucker, participated extensively in RacquetX, the highly popular gathering of hundreds of tennis industry leaders and thinkers held in Ft. Lauderdale on the eve of the Miami Open.

Over the course of 48 action-packed hours, Pressman and Drucker conducted and led half a dozen seminar-like events – all devoted to providing first-rate insights on how to become a better tennis player.

One highlight moment: “Brave New Ball-Hopper,” a panel led by Drucker that featured such coaching notables as former WTA pro Viktoria Belinsky, former ATP pro Claudio Pistolesi, and, from the USTA, Brian Parkkonen.  This lively dialogue touched on such topics as how to effectively understand the makeup of a particular player, the implications of mid-match coaching, and much more.

According to Pressman, who joined the publication in the summer of 2025 and is also the publisher-editor of Florida Tennis, “The mission of tennisplayer.net is to help players learn, compete, and improve.  Our founder, the late John Yandell, was a visionary when it came to truly understanding how the game is played and how it can best be taught.  We’re very excited to continuing fulfilling and extending John’s legacy.”

Drucker and Pressman also staged five instructional seminars. These were led by a variety of prominent coaches — John Sherwood from Saviano High Performance Tennis on the return of serve, Casey Curtis on the serve, Belinsky on how to teach the volley, Oscar Borras on pattern recognition, Gaby Paz on the contemporary forehand.

“Everything from technology tools to sports science makes this an exciting time for tennis instruction,” said Drucker, who began editing tennisplayer.net in December ’25.  “What a treat it was to gather and work with so many great minds in a setting as lively as RacquetX.”

Drawing on an unsurpassed library of more than 100,000 slow and super slow-motion videos that reveal the mechanics of decades of skilled players, each issue of tennisplayer.net focuses on a single instructional concept.  Over the years, tennisplayer.net issues have included stories by many of the world’s most prominent coaches, including Allen Fox, Chris Lewit, Robert Lansdorp, Jim Loehr, Rick Macci, and Jack Groppel. 

The March 2026 issue was devoted to the serve, featuring articles by four prominent coaches – former pros Alexandra Stevenson and Rick Meyer contributed, as did longstanding leaders Kyle LaCroix and Peter Freeman. 

Future issues will address such topics as the next big things in junior tennis, the transition game, match management, and, come August, an issue devoted strictly to incoming International Tennis Hall of Fame inductee Roger Federer. 

“Roger has given fans all over the world so much joy with his beautiful tennis,” said Drucker.  “Our thinking is that our community of first-rate instructors is best-equipped to dissect how he did that – even what other players can learn from Roger and apply to their own tennis.”

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for more leading-edge instructional content, check out:

tennisplayer.net

The post Busy March in Miami for Leading-Edge Instructional Publication tennisplayer.net appeared first on World Tennis Magazine.

CHARLESTON, S.C. – – Jessica Pegula never gave anyone else a chance to win this tournament once she stepped on the Credit One Charleston One center court Sunday afternoon. The final was almost over from the start.

Three games after the start, the fifth-ranked Pegula actually won the next 10 games against Ukrainian Yuliia Starodubtseva and had her chances to almost win the next two games. Pegula then finished the 82-minute job with a love service game to complete a 6-2, 6-2 romp past a player who had been expected to put up a fight against Pegula.

It was as if Pegula came fully alive and wanted to get the job done as quickly as possible. Yuliia never really got into the match. Pegula played almost perfect tennis, while Yuliia could hardly keep the ball in play.

YULIIA STRUGGED WITH HER GAME

The pre-match word had been that Starodubtseva could be very competitiveness. She wasn’t.

Of course, Pegula had something to do with the 26-year-old former Old Dominion University tennis player’s performance. After all, Starodubtseva had scored a straight-set victory in the semifinals over Madison Keys, a talented player who won the 2025 Australian Open.

The Ukrainian had won five straight victories to earn a berth in the final. She has to be happy about her share of the $2.3 million prize money.

RARE BACK-TO-BACK TITLES

Of course, the 32-year-old Pegula was thrilled by her success and the winner’s share of the big purse. She is only the second player to win back-to-back Charleston championships since the tournament moved to Daniel Island from Hilton Head Island in 2001. Serena Williams won the title in 2012 and 2013.

“It was a really tough week,” Pegula said about her four straight wins after losing the first sets.

“I was playing much better and feeling much better (Sunday).”

Pegula has played 200 consecutive weeks in the top 10.

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James Beck (843-795-3584, h)

The post Jessica Pegula Gave No Quarter In Charleston Open Final appeared first on World Tennis Magazine.

BY JAMES BECK

CHARLESTON, S.C. – – You might say that Jessica Pegula was lucky Saturday afternoon.

She could have lost to 18-year-old Iva Jovic. The tall Californian is just that good.

A year from now, Jovic might be winning Grand Slam titles. She came close to taking out the top-seeded Pegula Saturday in the semifinals of the Credit One Charleston Open.

Pegula did what other opponents had been doing all week long to her. She won the first set against Jovic.

It could have been Jovic’s set. After all, she fought off seven break points in the third game to take a 3-0 lead against Pegula.

PEGULA  HOLDS ON TO TAKE FIRST SET

Pegula was determined not to lose a fourth straight opening set, although Jovic had to rally from double game point in the seventh game to rally into a 4-3 lead.

That was as far as Jovic could go in the first set, even though she had one break point in the eighth game and an ad-point in the ninth game. That was before Pegula won the 10^th game to take the first set in what ended up a 6-4, 5-7, 6-3 victory for Pegula and a spot in Sunday’s final opposite relatively  unknown Ukraine native Yuliia Starodubtseva.

Starodubtseva is best known in tennis circles from her years of playing at Old Dominion University. She is 26 years old and  ranked only 89^th in the world.

YULIIA’S RANKING HEADED UP

Like Jovic, Yuliia is headed upward in the rankings after her 6-1, 6-4 conquest of 2025 Australian Open champion Madison Keys to earn a spot in Sunday’s final against Pegula.

Jovic is the most talented looking player to come along in the women’s game in a number of years. She has all the tools. She is a tall 5-8, but looks taller. Her ground strokes are low and crisp, much like her serves. Just keep an eye on her.

She likes hard courts and plays like Pete Sampras. Watch out  Aryna Sabalenka and Coco Gauff.

PEGULA CRITIQUES JOVIC’S GAME

Pegula, of course, has her own critique of the talented Jovic, who has moved all the way up to 16^th in the WTA rankings.

“She’s really good at kind of taking time and space away, and I think sometimes when you can force somebody to have to go for things that they’re necessarily not comfortable with, then that can be a very good strategy, and that’s something that I use against a lot of players,” Pegula said.

“But I do think against someone like her (Jovic), she definitely likes pace, I think, and you could tell that when I hit kind of the same ball over and over again, she would start to play better.”

Starodubtseva was definitely happy to earn a berth in her first tour-level final.

“Thoughts are great,” Starodubtseva said. “I mean, definitely excited to play in the final. Charleston is a great tournament, and I feel like it’s a strong 500 to be in the final of. So feeling a little proud of myself today.

“I feel like I belong here, and I feel comfortable playing in a big crowd and feel the noise.”

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James Beck (843-795-3584, h)

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James Beck was the 2003 winner of the USTA National Media Award  for print media. A 1995 MBA graduate of The Citadel, he can be reached at Jamesbecktennis@gmail.com.

The post After Facing Upstart Iva Jovic, Jessica Pegula Takes On Another In Yuliia Starodubtseva In Charleston Final appeared first on World Tennis Magazine.

BY JAMES BECK

CHARLESTON, S.C. – – Two veteran stars appear almost ready to battle for a second Credit One Charleston Open tennis title.

Jessica Pegula and Madison Keys each have tasted a title on Daniel Island. And now they are within one victory each of clashing in Sunday’s final. Each lost the first set of their quarterfinal matches on Friday, but cruised after that.

The question is whether rising star Iva Jovic or relatively unknown Yuliia Starodubtseva is capable of spoiling the setup.

PEGULA WINS THIRD STRAIGHT THREE-SETTER

Defending champion Pegula won her third straight match after losing the first set each time. This time it was powerful left-hander Diana Schnaider, the No. 7 seed, who suffered a three-set loss to Pegula, 3-6, 6-3, 6-2.

Keys, the 2019 Charleston champion, came back with solid play against 2022 Charleston winner Belinda Bencic of Switzerland to take a 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 victory in the quarterfinals. Bencic was the No. 3 seed, two spots ahead of Keys in the seedings.

“I’m really happy that I didn’t get too down on myself and was able to kind of recover quickly, and overall I think I played pretty solid second and third sets,” Keys said.

KEYS GAINS CONFIDENCE IN SERVE

Keys, the talented hard-hitting 2025 Australian Open champion added, “I think it was really important (his return game). I think that, even with the score line being the way that it was, I even had a few more break point chances that I kind of set myself up for pressure.

“And I think it kind of also gives you a little bit of confidence going into your own serve just knowing that you’ll always in her service games as well.”

PEGULA FACES TALENTED YOUNG PLAYER

Pegula was just happy that she was able to pull out a third straight match by winning the last two sets.

“I think I was a little more frustrated today after the first set,” Pegula admitted.

Pegula might have it even tougher on Saturday against No. 4 seed Iva Jovic, a talented 5-8, 18-year-old American who defeated 2020 Australian Open champion in the round of 16 and then took a 6-3, 6-4 win over No. 8 seed Anna Kalinskaya in the quarterfinals.

“I do think that this week is something that I can really build off of,” Pegula said. “There’s a lot of things that I feel like I can get better at that I’m not doing that well right now . . .”

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James Beck (843-795-3584, h)

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James Beck was the 2003 winner of the USTA National Media Award  for print media. A 1995 MBA graduate of The Citadel, he can be reached at Jamesbecktennis@gmail.com.

The post Madison Keys, Jessica Pegula Appear Headed For A Charleston Collision appeared first on World Tennis Magazine.

BY JAMES BECK

CHARLESTON, S.C. – – Jessica Pegula is one tough cookie on a tennis court, especially when it’s the green clay courts of Charleston.

If you were or had been in the stands at Credit One Stadium Wednesday afternoon in the second round of the $2,300 Credit One Charleston Open, you would have noticed that “Pegula trait” while watching the last two sets of a three-hour marathon. Pegula had a really tough time keeping pace with Yulia Putintseva of Kazakhstani in the first set.

PEGULA SURPRISED BY YULIA’S PLAY

It didn’t matter that Putintseva is ranked No. 72 and is a 5-4, 31-year-old who also gave it her all until Pegula slammed that last forehand for a winner to wrap up Pegula’s 4-6, 6-4, 7-5 victory before a crowd that always seemed to be pulling for Pegula.

After all that the fans had seen this day, they might not have expected Pegula to come up with a double break point and then three more break points to take a 6-5 lead in the final set. That set up a rush through her serve for an ace for triple match point before then double faulting before closing out the match.

Long rallies, sometimes hard and other times with drop shots were the order for both players. Both appeared to be capable of winning the entire tournament as Pegula did a year ago. Long rallies were the order of the day, as it often is on clay courts.

LEAVING BASELINE TO HIT WINNERS

The shot-making often was amazing. Pegula’s most beneficial shots in the last two sets were her charges to the middle of her court to cut off Putintseva’s shots and deliver winners.

Pegula seemed to be surprised by the shot-making ability of Putintseva early in the match, maybe because she had never lost a match to Putintseva and had “never played her on clay before.”

“I knew it was going to be really tough against Yulia,” Pegula said. “I think she’s somewhat of a clay courter, especially with the way she was playing today. I didn’t feel like she missed many balls (and) was not giving me any free points. I had to win every single point.”

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James Beck (843-795-3584, h)

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James Beck was the 2003 winner of the USTA National Media Award  for print media. A 1995 MBA graduate of The Citadel, he can be reached at Jamesbecktennis@gmail.com.

The post Jessica Pegula Show Just How Tough She Can Be On A Tennis Court appeared first on World Tennis Magazine.

Tennis fans are completely spoiled right now. The current era of the professional tour is basically a math equation that solves itself in real time. When a top-tier player steps onto the pristine hardcourts, the drama is mostly theatrical. Everyone watching already knows exactly how the broadcast ends. A heavily favored superstar on a massive winning streak is going to absolutely bulldoze an unseeded qualifier in straight sets. It takes an absolute miracle for a massive upset to actually materialize. That predictable, metronomic dominance makes tracking the numbers incredibly relaxing. The geometry of the court is clean, the crowd is silent and the best athlete almost always advances. However, a massive problem arises when the hardcourt swing wraps up and tennis fanatics decide to take their predictive bankrolls over to the football pitch just to kill some time.

The “Dead Cert” Delusion

The concept of a guaranteed victory actually exists in professional tennis. If a top-three player is healthy, throwing down a sport bet on them to win a first-round major match feels like cashing a completely free paycheck. The odds make total logical sense. But taking that exact same bulletproof confidence into a massive Saturday soccer derby is a recipe for absolute financial disaster.

Soccer is fundamentally designed to break hearts and ruin basic math. A multi-billion-dollar super-team can easily lose to a squad of part-time workers fighting relegation just because the ball hit a weird patch of mud in the eighty-ninth minute. Tennis is an isolated, heavily controlled one-on-one environment where the better athlete grinds out a win over three hours. Soccer is a chaotic, eleven-on-eleven bar fight where a single terrible referee decision or a totally random red card completely vaporizes the pre-game statistics. Fans who treat a Premier League powerhouse like they treat a Grand Slam champion learn a very expensive lesson incredibly fast.

Why Grass and Clay Logic Fails on the Pitch

There is a brutal reality check waiting for anyone crossing over from the baseline to the penalty box. In tennis, if it starts raining, they close the billion-dollar roof. The conditions remain perfectly sterile. Tracking historical match data and serve percentages is basically a cheat code for predicting the future in those environments. If a guy wins ninety percent of his first-serve points, the data directly correlates to an easy victory.

On the pitch, twenty-two guys will play through a literal monsoon. A team can hold eighty percent possession, perfectly execute their tactical game plan and still lose the match one to zero because of a lucky, deflected counter-attack. The sheer volume of uncontrollable variables makes placing a traditional win-or-lose wager feel like throwing darts blindfolded. You cannot just blindly back the heavy favorite and go make a sandwich. The underdog always has a legitimate puncher’s chance, and the oddsmakers aggressively price that chaos into the board every single weekend.

Surviving the Weekend Accumulator

When the tennis calendar hits a slow patch, jumping into global soccer dashboards is the standard move for analytics nerds trying to keep their brains totally engaged. But surviving that transition requires a total strategy overhaul. Anyone spending hours tracking ATP ranking movements and intense tournament draws already has the analytical stamina required to beat the house. They just need to stop looking at the final score.

The absolute smartest way to drop a sport bet on a weekend soccer fixture is to completely ignore which franchise will actually win the match. Instead of risking a weekend entertainment budget on a favored team that might totally choke under pressure, sharp fans pivot to the granular stuff. The exact same hyper-focused energy used to track double-fault ratios easily translates into tracking corner kicks, possession metrics and total yellow card counts. It strips away the emotional attachment to the jersey colors.

Rewiring the Racket Brain

This is exactly where the obsessive tennis mindset actually becomes a massive superpower. Normal soccer fans lazily watch the ball float around the pitch; analytics nerds watch the underlying mechanical structure of the formations. Figuring out exactly how a specific midfielder handles a high-pressing defense is exactly like analyzing how a baseline defender handles a heavy topspin forehand.

Once the brain stops looking for a guaranteed winner and starts treating the soccer pitch like a giant math puzzle, the viewing experience completely changes. Grabbing a third sport bet on a hyper-specific micro-event (like predicting exactly how many total fouls will happen in the first half) totally removes the brutal stress of needing a specific striker to score a goal. It turns a wildly unpredictable, low-scoring draw into a fascinating, data-driven sweat. The transition from the pristine hardcourts to the muddy stadiums of Europe is a massive culture shock, but embracing the total unpredictability is the only way to actually enjoy the weekend.

Jannik Sinner at the 2026 Miami Open (Photo by Justin Cohen Photography)

The post Sinner’s Streak and the “Dead Cert” Delusion appeared first on World Tennis Magazine.

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BY JAMES BECK

CHARLESTON, S,C. — Monday didn’t sound like a big day at the Credit One Charleston Open. Opening days and lesser players aren’t usually a big day.

But this Monday was a little different.

Sloane Stephens was on center court in early afternoon. The fans are always there to see former champions. So, it was a big event.

The 2017 U.S. Open champion was home. Stephens has been coming to the country’s premiere WTA women’s only tennis tournament for a long time. After all, Sloane is 33 years old.

IT WASN’T SLOANE’S DAY

This wasn’t Stephens’ day on Daniel Island. Nothing seemed to work for her on the green clay court.

Not even against 5-3, 28-year-old Renata Zarazua’s deadly drop shots. Stephens just couldn’t get to the little Mexican’s drop shots that seemed to come early in most points.

Sloane tried her best, but usually arrived a step too late to return the drop shots.

Stephens hardly could win a point after Zarazua won two games in the first set. The final score was 6-2, 6-0 in Zarazua’s fapor.

After all, Stephens was now in wild card territory after playing just six events in 2025.

ZARAZUA MADE HER DAY COUNT

Zarazua just did get into the COCO main draw with her No. 85 WTA ranking. She got a little help by the withdrawals of No. 6 Amanda Anisimova No. 25 Emma Navarro.

Stephens was always expected to be a sports star. She came from a family of athletes. Her deceased father John Stephens was a Pro Bowl running back for the New England Patriots and her mother Sybil was an All-American swimmer for Boston University.

Of course, Stephens’ biggest win was her victory over her friend Madison Keys in the 2017 U.S. Open final a year after winning the Charleston event. She later won a Charleston doubles title in 2024.

Maybe Sloane has a big day ahead of her.

The post Charleston’s Opening Day Didn’t Belong To Sloane Stephens appeared first on World Tennis Magazine.

@TennisPublisher

It’s not just that Jannik Sinner became only the eighth man to win the “Sunshine Double” with his win at the Miami Open.

It’s that he won two of the biggest titles in tennis consecutively without losing a set.

Sinner ended a dominant month of March with a 6-4, 6-4 win over Jiri Lehecka to win the Miami Open, two weeks to the day after winning the BNP Parisbas Open in Indian Wells, joining an elite group of seven other men players to turn the trick of winning the two first quarter North American hard court Masters 1000-level championships.

The Sunshine Double has long been viewed as a benchmark of dominance, requiring not only peak performance but sustained excellence over two grueling weeks. The Italian world No. 2 joins Jim Courier (1991). Michael Chang (1992), Pete Sampras (1994), Marcelo Rios (1998), Andre Agassi (2001), Roger Federer (2005, 2006, 2017), Novak Djokovic (2011, 2014, 2015, 2016) as men to win the Sunshine Double.

In his post-match press conference following the win, Sinner was asked to compare the difficulty of winning the Sunshine Double versus a major singles title  Said Sinner, “It’s tough to say and tough to compare. I don’t want the truth. You know, both are very difficult but Grand Slams are always a bit different, I feel like. Best-of-five and throughout two full weeks, things can change throughout one night. You know, maybe you wake up not feeling well, and you know, the body maybe might not feel a little bit more. But also, here, you know, physically it’s tough, because when you go far in Indian Wells, you come here a little bit tired. But the motivation is very high, because you come from a very confidence boost, also. But, yeah, I don’t want to compare.”

Sinner’s main rival, world No. 1 Carlos Alcaraz, who was fresh off winning the Australian Open in January to complete a career Grand Slam sweep of all four majors in a career, did not advance far enough in both events to face Sinner. He lost in the semifinals of Indian Wells, his first loss of the 2026 season, and then fell in the third round in Miami to American Sebi Korda.

From the opening games of the final, Sinner looked locked in. His serve was his biggest weapon, hitting 10 aces, winning 92 percent of first set points and getting 68 percent of his first serves in. Even more impressively, he did not drop a match across both tournaments, showcasing a level of consistency that signals a player entering his prime — and perhaps beginning a new standard – and to catch up on Alcaraz, who has won the last two major singles titles in Australia and at the U.S. Open.

Despite the loss, this tournament marked a significant milestone for Lehecka. Reaching his first Masters 1000 final, the young Czech proved he belongs on the sport’s biggest stages. His powerful game and fearless approach earned him wins over top-tier opponents throughout the fortnight. Though he fell short in the final, his performance in Miami suggests that his breakthrough is only just beginning.

The post Jannik Sinner Wins Miami Open To Complete “Sunshine Double” appeared first on World Tennis Magazine.