Amid a tense final-set tiebreak battle in the Indian Wells final, the level between Aryna Sabalenka and Elena Rybakina peaked.
With points locked at 5-5, Rybakina struck a crisp backhand winner up the line to reach championship point, which Sabalenka erased on the next point with a searing backhand winner of her own.
“This is absolutely out of this world,” commentator Sophie Amiach exclaimed on the broadcast. “Is this actually possible, what we’re seeing right now? It is outstanding.”
Added co-commentator Pete Odgers: “I think it’s safe to say the WTA is in very good hands for many, many years to come. What a rivalry this has blossomed into.”
This time Sabalenka prevailed, turning the tables on Rybakina who had stunned the world No.1 in a similarly-thrilling Australian Open final less than two months earlier.
The two matches bore a striking resemblance. In both, Sabalenka lost the first set, rebounded to win the second, and went up a break in the third. But unlike at Melbourne Park, where she faltered against a fast-finishing Rybakina, this time she was stronger when the pressure was at its highest.
From 6-all in that final tiebreak, she forced two errors from her rival to finally win the Indian Wells crown in her third finals appearance.
In doing so, she snapped a four-match losing streak to Rybakina in finals – her last win came in the AO 2023 final – while also ending Rybakina’s 12-match winning streak against top-10 opponents.
Sabalenka revealed she learned from the AO final, where Rybakina sealed victory with a thunderous ace out wide.
“Seeing that match point at the Australian Open that she had, I don’t know how many times it was in my feed (smiling). So I remember that,” Sabalenka said. “[This time] I was standing there thinking ‘OK, I gotta cover wide serve’ and I left T serve for her to ace it or whatever. So lucky me she served again wide serve, and I just covered that side.
“It doesn’t matter how fast the serve is; I know that I can block it and I can return. So I got super lucky on that point, and yeah, I pull out really great two shots.
“I feel like that was the moment that gave me so much mental power.”
The serve Rybakina clocked out wide at championship point in that tiebreak was almost 195km/h, making Sabalenka’s Houdini act all the more impressive.
With her win, she reinforced her status as world No.1 – a position she has held uninterrupted for 74 weeks. This year she has already won two titles and built a 17-1 record, her only loss coming at the AO to Rybakina. She has now reached nine ‘big’ finals (Grand Slams and WTA 1000s) since the beginning of 2025, winning four.
Rybakina has this week risen to world No.2 for the first time and joined Sabalenka as one of a select few women to reach both the Australian Open and Indian Wells finals in the same season on multiple occasions. The others? Monica Seles, Martina Hingis and Lindsay Davenport.
Rybakina and Sabalenka’s Indian Wells final was their 16th clash, tying them with Iga Swiatek and Coco Gauff as the two active players with the most tour-level main-draw meetings.
And this was their sixth match-up in a final, making this the first title match between two players to have met in six or more finals since Serena and Venus Williams at Australian Open 2017.
“The WTA has been short on transcendent mano a mano material for too many years while the Big Three and their successors have taken men’s rivalries to new heights,” tennis writer Chris Clarey noted in his Tennis & Beyond Substack.
“But Sabalenka and Rybakina already have created something special, routinely pushing each other to the limit with big titles on the line.
“Sunday’s match in brutal 96-degree [Fahrenheit, 35C] heat might have been their most compelling work yet.”
Sabalenka and Rybakina now head to Miami, where at least one of them has appeared in the past three finals.
Could another blockbuster await fans in two weeks’ time?