Elena Rybakina Defeats Aryna Sabalenka to Claim US Open Title and No. 1 Ranking
Aryna Sabalenka stopped mid-rally on the practice court and glanced toward Arthur Ashe Stadium, eyes fixed on a screen somewhere in the distance. For a brief second, her face betrayed what the rankings would soon confirm. Then she turned back to the baseline and started hitting again.
The threat had been creeping up on her for months. Elena Rybakina’s rise was not a sudden surge; it was a slow, relentless climb that began at the end of last season. She closed 2025 by beating Sabalenka in the WTA Finals Riyadh championship match. Weeks later in Melbourne, she clawed back from 3-0 down in the deciding set to beat her again and lift the Australian Open trophy.
By the time the tour rolled into North America, the equation was clear. Rybakina, 27, reached the final in Montreal and dragged herself back into the race for No. 1. Then her body threatened to betray her. A left ankle and heel tendon problem flared up in Cincinnati, forcing her to withdraw from the quarter-finals after aggravating what she called a “chronic foot injury”. Her US Open looked in doubt.
She waited until the last possible moment to commit to New York. Once she did, she barely took a backward step.
Rybakina stormed through the opening week without losing a set. Her demolition of Naomi Osaka in the round of 16 changed the tone of the tournament. Seven aces. Eighty-seven percent of points won behind her first serve. It was not just a win; it was a statement.
Sabalenka saw every frame.
Asked about the ranking chase as Rybakina closed in, the world No. 1 tried to shut that storyline down.
“I completely separate myself from that, because it’s just guessing. It’s like if, if, if, if. I’m just trying to bring my best tennis every time I’m competing out there and basically fight for it,” she said after reaching the quarter-finals.
When the moment finally came and Rybakina officially took the top spot, Sabalenka bristled.
“I don’t care!”
She made it clear she would trade the ranking for the US Open trophy without hesitation.
Rybakina, though, was not interested in choosing. She wanted both. She pushed through Coco Gauff in the semi-finals, the former US Open champion unable to match the precision and weight of shot coming from the other side of the net. Gauff snatched the first set but could not hold back the tide. The reigning Australian Open winner turned the match around and walked into her first US Open final with the draw’s biggest obstacle still standing.
Sabalenka awaited, unbeaten on Arthur Ashe Stadium for two years, the dominant force in New York and on the verge of rare history. One more win and she would become only the third woman ever to win three straight US Open titles.
The stage was hers. The night belonged to Rybakina.
In a bruising final that lasted 2 hours 21 minutes, Rybakina beat Sabalenka 6-4, 5-7, 6-2, ripping away both the title and the ranking in one decisive performance. The match swung wildly, but the key moments fell to the Kazakh.
She broke first, moving ahead 3-2 in the opening set despite landing just 27% of her first serves. If the serve wasn’t there, the groundstrokes were. She hammered her way through rallies, taking time away from Sabalenka and leaning on her timing to blunt the Belarusian’s power. The set went to Rybakina, not through perfection, but through sheer force of will.
Her first-serve percentage climbed to 61% in the second set. The scoreboard, though, refused to yield. She failed to convert either of her two break points and suddenly found herself under pressure. At 3-4 and then 4-5, she had to fend off two set points just to stay in touch. She held for 5-5, but Sabalenka dug in, broke two games later and dragged the final into a decider.
For a moment, it looked like the momentum had shifted. It didn’t last.
Rybakina reset, tightened her patterns, and seized control again. She broke for 2-1 in the third set, then pressed harder. At 5-2, she stepped forward, knocked off a volley winner to earn another break, and stood on the brink. A few points later, she finished the job with her 12th ace, echoing the way she had closed out the Australian Open eight months earlier.
With that final strike, she completed the best Grand Slam season of her career and climbed to the summit of the sport. When the WTA rankings are updated on Monday, Rybakina will become the 30th woman to hold the world No. 1 spot in the Open Era. She also carved out a slice of history: the first woman since Steffi Graf in 1995 to beat the world No. 1 in two Grand Slam finals in the same year. Graf did it against Arantxa Sánchez-Vicario in Paris and Monica Seles in New York. Rybakina has done it twice against Sabalenka.
On the other side of the net, the cost to Sabalenka was brutal. In 72 hours, she lost the ranking and the trophy. The season ends without a Grand Slam title for her for the first time since 2022. The on-court meltdown after the defeat — the smashed racquet, the visible fury, the swallowed tears — told its own story.
Yet even as she left New York, Sabalenka’s competitive edge remained intact.
“I don't even know how many weeks I was able to be there, but it was amazing. Let's see if Elena can beat me in that. If she continues playing like that, I'm in trouble,” she said, already turning the loss into a new target.
Rybakina has climbed to the top. Sabalenka has been knocked down. The question now is simple: how long can one hold that throne with the other charging straight back at it?
