Australian Open 2025 Women's Finals - Let's talk about THAT Madison Keys Point...
Third Set, 5:5, 30:30, Keys Serving
First, a refresher on the point itself:
How has this service game played out so far?
0:0 - Keys misses a 1st serve aimed to jam Sabalenka’s backhand, and her second serve is a slow kick serve that curves into Sabalenka’s forehand, allowing her to go on the attack.
The return is up the middle and not that deep, which allows Keys to go down the middle with more pace. Sabalenka stands her ground and hits almost a kneeling backhand up the middle, with just as much speed as the ball coming in.
Keys now has a few options - give up court positioning and hit a loopier ball, or stand her ground as well and try to turn this neutral exchange into an offensive one for herself. Keys chooses the second option, but tries to do too many things at once (stand firm on court positioning AND redirect a fast incoming ball), spraying the ball long to Sabalenka’s backhand.
0:15 - Keys hits a hard first serve to Sabalenka’s backhand that yields a return error.
15:15 - Keys misses her first serve wide to Sabalenka’s forehand this time. Her second serve gets pounced on by Sabalenka, who unloads a forehand down the line just out of Keys’ reach.
15:30 Keys switches directions, hits her first serve down the T (up the middle) to Sabalenka’s forehand, yielding another unreturned serve. Sabalenka actually split-steps slightly towards her backhand in anticipation of the wide serve, only to realize it’s going the other way.
So why is this particular point so important?
The stakes could not be higher on this point. It is 5:5 in the 3rd set, so we are at the tail end of the match. As Brad Gilbert outlines in his book “Winning Ugly”, 30:30 is essentially the same as Deuce, meaning whoever wins this point only has to win one more point to win the service game. If Sabalenka successfully breaks Keys’ serve, Keys would have to break Sabalenka’s serve just to stay in the match and force a 10-point tiebreaker. Keys has not had a break point yet in the third set, so that is a tall order.
If Keys wins this point and eventually holds serve, she’s up 6:5, which creates scoreboard pressure for Sabalenka (rationally it shouldn’t matter, because Sabalenka holds serve at one of the highest rates on the WTA tour, but seeing the scoreboard and seeing that you’re “behind” probably plays at you psychologically even if you are a multiple Major winner). It also allows Keys to play a more aggressive return game to try to up her chances of breaking serve (the worst thing that happens is it goes to a 10-point tiebreaker, not that she loses the match). Suffice to say, winning the point at 30:30 has potential domino effects that could really shift the match for either player.
Can we talk about the point itself yet?
Okay fine - it’s 30:30 now, and Keys is working with the following information
She hasn’t made a first serve on the deuce side in this game (0:0, 15:15)
She’s gone for the body, and gone wide, and neither have worked
Her second serve has gotten her in a lot of trouble
The only point where there’s been a rally, she tried to keep aggressive court positioning and try to out hit Sabalenka, only to miss a forehand long.
When she gets a first serve in, she has a huge advantage (she probably doesn’t know this, but in the 3rd set, she’s only lost 3 points when she’s made her first serve)
So no matter what, she needs the first serve to go in to maximize her chances of winning this point.
Oh…oh no…She goes for the same body/backhand first serve she went for at 0:0, and missed long. Now she has to decide where to hit her second serve. Should she spin it into the middle of the box and let Sabalenka crush it? Or gamble with the location to catch Sabalenka off guard?
Keys chooses the latter, slicing her serve wide to Sabalenka’s forehand. After all, if Sabalenka’s going to get a forehand, at least make her hit it while on the run.
Sabalenka is a great mover, so she can still get to this serve and hit it back with pace. She does that, and hits it up deep, and up the middle (a safe shot that can still bother the server).
Again, Keys is presented with two choices: take a step back and hit a higher, more defensive ball, or stand her ground and take time away from Sabalenka’s recovery while she’s getting back to the middle of the court from the doubles alley. Keys has every reason to go defensive: it’s a safer shot, it guarantees that she stays in the point, even a safe shot would likely be to Sabalenka’s backhand which, while scary, is not as scary as her forehand, and she literally just missed the same shot 3 points ago.
Keys refuses to let the forehand error at 0:0 deter her, doubles down and hits into the open court…
…landing a clean winner that kisses the inside of the singles sideline. What a gutsy move.
This sets up 40:30, where Keys hits a first serve to Sabalenka’s backhand, then hits her serve plus-one back into the backhand corner, behind Sabalenka for another winner to seal the service game.
What happened after?
It is now 5:6, Sabalenka serving, and Keys has turned the aggression up significantly. She forces a Sabalenka forehand shank, rips a backhand return winner off a Sabalenka first serve, misses a backhand return (that she absolutely tees off on), and earns two Championship points off of a forehand cross-court rally in which Sabalenka hits a forehand into the net trying to go down the line. At 15:40, Sabalenka hits a T-serve that Keys returns just wide. At 30:40 (Championship Point #2), Keys immediately puts Sabalenka on defense with a superb backhand return, then eventually puts the ball away with a two-ball forehand sequence into the ad-court to seal the Australian Open. It should be noted that Sabalenka did not miss a single first serve in this game, and all of the aggressive returns that Keys hit were off of well hit, pacey first serves.
But without that 5:5, 30:30 point, none of this would have happened. The forehand winner was a product of sheer conviction, utter commitment to her game style, and the mental strength to brush the previous error aside. Chapeau to Madison Keys, the 2025 Australian Open Womens’ Champion.