Keys saves three match points to top Kenin; sets Paris meeting vs. Baptiste
Madison Keys came back from the brink of defeat at Roland Garros on Saturday.
No. 7 seed Keys saved three match points to battle past No. 31 seed Sofia Kenin 4-6, 6-3, 7-5 in an all-American third-round clash on Court Suzanne-Lenglen on Saturday.
Keys and another American, Hailey Baptiste, will now resume their entertaining head-to-head, with a spot in a Grand Slam quarterfinal on the line.
Earlier on Saturday, Baptiste defeated Jessica Bouzas Maneiro of Spain 7-6(4), 6-1 on Court 14, making the Round of 16 at a Grand Slam for the first time in her career.
In 88 minutes, Baptiste avenged an extremely narrow loss to Bouzas Maneiro in an ITF Challenger final in Morelia, Mexico last year, where the American was unable to convert four championship points.
Rivalry renewed: At her Washington D.C. hometown tournament in 2019, a teenaged Baptiste upset Keys in their first meeting. Ranked No. 283 at the time, it was Baptiste's first Top 20 win -- and her first Top 100 win.
"It was my first WTA match," Baptiste reminisced, in her post-match press. "I had a lot of nerves and a lot of excitement, and I was obviously playing somebody that I looked up to. I was just loose, having fun, I was in my hometown."
However, Keys prevailed in their next two meetings. The first was a routine win at 2023 Charleston, but Keys needed a third-set tiebreak to get past Baptiste at 2024 Indian Wells.
"I had a few match points in that [Indian Wells] match," Baptiste said. "I'm definitely looking to play her again and change the narrative, because that one definitely stung."
Calendar Slam still alive: On Saturday, reigning Australian Open champion Keys needed all of her mettle to take down Kenin, the 2020 Australian Open champion and 2020 Roland Garros finalist.
"Obviously a really tough match," Keys said afterwards. "I think [Kenin] played especially well, and having to save those match points, I really just tried to dig deep. I really wanted to make sure that she won the point and I didn't give it away."
After dropping the first set, Keys saved four break points in a hold for 2-1 in the second set. Keys used the momentum from that escape to ease through the rest of that set and level the match.
But she did not keep that momentum, initially. First, Keys had to fight back from 3-0 down in the third set. Then she evaded a trio of match points at 5-4, needing some of her most hard-hitting shots to stay alive and hold for 5-5.
After that, Keys took control. She executed a powerful return game to break for 6-5, leading in the third set for the first time. Keys then cracked back-to-back aces to reach match point, and she wrapped up the comeback after 2 hours and 20 minutes.
Keys is now into the Roland Garros Round of 16 for the fifth time. She was a semifinalist in 2018 and a quarterfinalist the following year.
Career-best Slam: As for Baptiste, she had never been beyond the second round of a Grand Slam event before this week. But her stock has been rising this year, especially on clay, a surface she enjoys.
Baptiste has notched 14 tour-level match-wins this year -- and over half of those wins (eight, to be exact) have come on clay. She is ranked a career-high No. 70 this week, and is projected to rise higher after her Paris results.
"I just put [recent success] on my confidence and the people that I have around me, and feeling good," Baptiste explained.
She had a tough task in Saturday's first set against 68th-ranked Bouzas Maneiro. The Spaniard was playing a Grand Slam third-round match for the third time, and she was also looking for her first Round of 16 result at a major.
Bouzas Maneiro took an early 2-0 lead, but Baptiste struck back for 2-2 and the battle was on. There were no further breaks of serve in the opener as the pair moved into the tiebreak.
A backhand winner by Baptiste gave the American a crucial 5-4 lead in the breaker, and she drew Bouzas Maneiro errors on the next two points to grind out the one-set lead after 55 minutes.
Baptiste made short work of the second set to post another clay-court victory. She finished the match with seven more winners and six fewer unforced errors than Bouzas Maneiro.
