MIAMI -- The Sunshine Double is a notoriously difficult feat.
And yet, Iga Swiatek is in position to become only the second woman to sweep the events at Indian Wells and Miami for a second time.
Steffi Graf did it in 1994 and 1996; Kim Clijsters (2005) and Victoria Azarenka (2016) managed the back-to-back achievement once. After winning the title at Indian Wells -- despite some drastic changes in time zones, humidity and tennis balls -- Swiatek is still alive in south Florida.
She advanced to the Round of 16 with a hard-fought 6-7(7), 6-4, 6-4 victory over Linda Noskova. The match time was a grueling two-and-a-half hours.
Ultimately, this one had to feel good, for Noskova is the same Czech Republic teenager who bounced the World No.1 from the Australian Open. Swiatek has now beaten her twice in two weeks.
With that, Swiatek has won 21 of her past 22 WTA 1000 matches -- 15 this year. She’s also triumphed in nine of 10 career matches at the Miami Open; only Martina Navratilova (10-0) started better.
Swiatek is famously 70-0 in WTA 1000 events when she wins the first set. She’s now 8-18 when she loses that opening stanza.
And Swiatek won’t have to work out her frustration in practice over blowing a 5-2 lead in the first set. Happily, the Monday schedule in Miami features all 16 players left in the draw. Swiatek gets No.14 seed Ekaterina Alexandrova, a three-set winner over No.21 Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova.
Here are some of the compelling storylines we’ll be keeping an eye on:
Navarro continues to dazzle
Emma Navarro, the 22-year-old from Charleston, is a giddy 20-6 for the season after defeating No.12 seed Jasmine Paolini 6-2, 3-6, 6-0. Only Swiatek has more wins.
And Navarro tends to do it the hard way. The majority of her matches (12) have come in three sets -- by far the most on tour. And while that suggests she’s one of the fittest players on tour, her success is creating a dilemma.
“I’m winning so many matches,” she said in a Tennis Channel interview, “it’s hard to get in the gym.”
Navarro has now defeated three Top 20 opponents in 2024 (Elina Svitolina and Aryna Sabalenka in Indian Wells and Paolini here), one more than she managed in her entire career before this season.
The fourth-round matchup is against No.5 Jessica Pegula, a 7-5, 6-4 winner over Leylah Fernandez. They’ve never played, but you get the idea that going forward this could be happening more often.
A giant killer
No one is managing the bigger moments better than Anna Kalinskaya.
The 25-year-old is 5-0 against Top 10 players this year, and she’ll get a crack at another one on Monday -- No.8 Maria Sakkari.
The No.22 seed upset No.10 Barbora Krejcikova in Adelaide and, in a career tournament, No.1 Swiatek, No.3 Coco Gauff and No.9 Jelena Ostapenko in Dubai. Last week here in Miami, Kalinskaya beat Ostapenko for a second time.
Kalinskaya suffered from a stomach ailment at Indian Wells and missed a few days of practice but said she’s feeling better.
“I never played [Sakkari] before, never practiced,” she said. “We hit a few balls in an exhibition in Australia. It’s not going to be easy, for sure.”
Sakkari, a finalist in Indian Wells a little over a week ago, has won seven of eight matches with David Witt in her coaching corner.
A winning recipe
Gauff and Pegula, the two top-ranked American women, have the homefield advantage here. Gauff (Delray Beach) and Pegula (Boca Raton) have been sleeping in their own beds and have a daily commute of less than an hour.
Pegula ran her stellar record in Miami to 10-2 over the past three years. Her 61 WTA 1000 victories are second only to Swiatek (77) this decade.
Gauff, for her part, has dropped only seven games in two matches. She’ll play Caroline Garcia on Tuesday in a fourth-round match.
“We all know how she plays,” Gauff said. “Takes the ball super early, plays very aggressive. I think for me it’s going to be important that I just kind of stick to my game and get the ball deep in the court and not let her run me around on the court.”
Bottom quarter (wide) open for business
One of these players is going to reach the semifinals:
No.32 seed Anhelina Kalinina saved a match point against Caroline Wozniacki in the second round and took out Sabalenka in the third.
No.27 Victoria Azarenka, an upset winner over No.7 Zheng Qinwen in the third round, has lifted this trophy three times in her outstanding career.
No.24 Katie Boulter, a champion in San Diego last month, beat No.11 Beatriz Haddad Maia in the third round.
Yulia Putintseva, the only unseeded player left in the bottom half of the draw, ranked No.68, defeated No.13 Liudmila Samsonova.
Meanwhile, on the other side …
Coincidentally (or not) there is only one unseeded player left in the top half of the draw -- No.53-ranked Danielle Collins.
The 2022 Australian Open champion was a 6-1, 6-2 winner over Elina Avanesyan -- who earlier in the event defeated No.6 Ons Jabeur. Collins, 30, has announced that this will be her last year.
On Tuesday, Collins will meet 33-year-old Sorana Cirstea, who defeated No.11 Daria Kasatkina 7-5, 6-2. Collins won the only match she played against Cirstea, six years ago in Rome.
Keys bouncing back
Madison Keys is, incredibly, playing in her 13th Miami Open.
The 29-year-old American reached the quarterfinals back in 2016, but she’s created some momentum here with wins over Diana Shnaider and Wang Xinyu. Coming off a lingering shoulder injury, Keys has won three of four matches in 2024, but her fourth-round opponent will be difficult.
That would be No.4 seed Elena Rybakina, a finalist here a year ago. Rybakina is 19-3 for the season with titles in Brisbane and Abu Dhabi.
