History made at US Open as Serena plays last match

Serena Williams played her last match at the U.S. Open, but new winners were crowned in the women’s singles and doubles finals and men’s single’s semifinals.

In the women’s singles final, world No. 1 ranked Iga Świątek from Poland defeated No. 5 Ons Jabeur from Tunisia with a 6-2, 7-6 victory. Świątek has now won her first US Open Championship and now has three major singles championships. 

For the men’s doubles final, the No. 1 ranked team of Rajeev Ram and Joe Salisbury narrowly defeated the No. 2 ranked pair of Wesley Koolhof and Neal Skupski in a match that ended 7-6, 6-5. Both Ram and Salisbury are five-time major champions following their win in the US Open final. 

During the women’s doubles final, the No. 12 ranked duo of Caroline Dolehide and Storm Sanders were defeated by the unranked American duo of Taylor Townsend and Caty McNally. Dolehide and Sanders took the first match 6-1 but Townsend and McNally adjusted and won the last two 6-3, 6-3. 

History was made during the semifinals of the men’s singles match as William Tiafoe became the first Black American man to reach the US Open semifinals since 1972. He played the match in the Arthur Ashe Stadium, which is named after the last Black American man to make it to the semifinals of the tournament. 

With the end of the tournament also came the end of the career of Serena Williams, who was one of the greatest tennis players of her generation and of all time. Williams had the second most Grand Slam titles with 23 total, trailing Margaret Court who has 24. Williams was also ranked No. 1 in women’s singles tennis for 319 weeks.  

Williams is stepping away from the game of tennis at 40 years old but undoubtedly had one of the greatest careers of all time.