10:43 AM ET Top seed Simona Halep claimed her second successive title, albeit six months apart, as she comfortably beat Elise Mertens to win the Prague Open on Sunday. The Romanian world No. 2, playing her first event since winning in Dubai in February, won 6-2, 7-5. 2 Related Halep had struggled to shake off
Tennis
3:24 PM ET Associated Press NEW YORK — Belinda Bencic became the latest top tennis player to pull out of the US Open, meaning three of the four female semifinalists in 2019 will not be at the Grand Slam tournament this year. Bencic wrote on social media on Saturday that she “made the difficult decision
1:01 PM ET Associated Press LEXINGTON, Ky. — Jil Teichmann reached the third final of her career by beating Shelby Rogers 6-3, 6-2 Saturday at the Top Seed Open, the first tennis tournament in the U.S. since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. The 116th-ranked Rogers, who is from South Carolina, was coming off a
1:01 PM ET Romanian top seed Simona Halep beat compatriot Irina-Camelia Begu in straight sets in the semifinals of the Prague Open on Saturday to set up a final with third seed Elise Mertens of Belgium. Halep was broken three times in the first set but managed to win the tiebreak before Begu, who finished
6:30 PM ET Associated Press LEXINGTON, Ky. — Entering Friday, Serena Williams had played 967 tour-level singles matches as a professional, with just four losses against opponents ranked outside the top 100 — and none in eight years. Well, it’s time to add to that list: Williams was beaten by No. 116 Shelby Rogers 1-6,
1:45 PM ET Simona Halep said she was slowly returning to her best form following the coronavirus hiatus as she cruised past Poland’s Magdalena Frech 6-2, 6-0 on Friday to reach the Prague Open semifinals. World No. 2 Halep made a rusty start to the claycourt tournament and needed three sets to win each of
10:19 AM ET The ATP on Friday issued a revised provisional calendar for the rest of 2020, highlighted by the Italian Open changing dates to take the place of the canceled Madrid Open. Play in Rome will now begin a week earlier than planned, on Sept. 14, the day after the US Open men’s final.
6:18 PM ET Associated Press Robert Ryland, the first Black professional tennis player and later a coach to such stars as Arthur Ashe and Serena and Venus Williams, has died. He was 100. Ryland died Aug. 2 at his stepson’s home in Provincetown, Massachusetts, on Cape Cod, his wife, Nancy Ingersoll, confirmed to The New
3:41 PM ET Associated Press Reigning US Open champion Bianca Andreescu pulled out of the Grand Slam tournament Thursday, saying the coronavirus pandemic prevented her from properly preparing for competition. Andreescu joins 2019 men’s champion Rafael Nadal in skipping the US Open. A year ago at age 19, Andreescu became the first woman in the
4:29 PM ET Associated Press LEXINGTON, Ky. — Serena Williams came back and won the last four games to beat her older sister, Venus, 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 in a hard-hitting, back-and-forth, second-round matchup at the Top Seed Open on Thursday. It was the 31st meeting of their careers — 22 1/2 years after the first.
8:13 AM ET World No. 1 Novak Djokovic says he will compete in the US Open. Djokovic announced his decision Thursday on his website, saying he is “excited” to play while acknowledging the “obstacles and challenges” of holding the major tournament amid the coronavirus pandemic. “I am aware that this time around it will be
8:42 PM ET D’Arcy MaineESPN.com Moments after her dominant first-round win over former world No. 1 Victoria Azarenka at the Top Seed Open on Tuesday, Venus Williams could barely contain her excitement during her on-court interview. After thanking the healthcare workers and the WTA, reflecting on what it was like to be back on court
2:13 PM ET Associated Press Kristyna Pliskova upset second-seeded Petra Martic 6-1, 7-5 to advance to the quarterfinals of the Prague Open on Wednesday. Pliskova, ranked 69th, hit nine aces and 28 winners on the way to her first win over her 14th-ranked opponent. It’s the eighth clay-court quarterfinal for the hard-serving Czech since she
2:58 PM ET Associated Press LEXINGTON, Ky. — Serena Williams won the hard way in her comeback following a six-month layoff, rallying to beat unseeded American Bernarda Pera 4-6, 6-4, 6-1 in Tuesday’s first round of the Top Seed Open. Aiming to return to form following the break caused by the coronavirus pandemic, the 23-time
4:27 PM ET Serena Williams said on Tuesday that she has become a student of the Bible during the long lockdown triggered by the coronavirus pandemic and believes that the book holds the key to achieving racial justice. “A lot of my time off, I’ve been studying the Bible,’ Williams said in a Zoom call
11:55 AM ET The International Tennis Federation has dropped a doping violation charge against American player Maksim Tikhomirov because of a lack of evidence. Tikhomirov had been charged with evading a doping test while playing a tournament in Cancun, Mexico, in January. However, the ITF said Tuesday that its Independent Tribunal found there wasn’t enough
10:25 PM ET Associated Press LEXINGTON, Ky. — Marie Bouzkova expected some adjustment to her first tennis tournament in nearly six months. First was the matter of shedding rust from the layoff caused by the coronavirus shutdown. The Czech Republic player also had to get her mind around the inaugural Top Seed Open and a
12:58 PM ET Associated Press NEW YORK — Svetlana Kuznetsova, the 2004 U.S. Open champion, added her name to the growing group of players withdrawing from the Grand Slam tournament because of the coronavirus pandemic. Kuznetsova wrote Monday on Instagram that she was pulling out of the U.S. Open and the tournament preceding it at