Alcaraz, Rybakina win Indian Wells tennis tournament

Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz defeated Russian Daniil Medvedev, 6-3, 6-2, in one hour, 10 minutes Sunday in Indian Wells to win the BNP Paribas Open men’s singles title and return to first in the Association of Tennis Professionals rankings.

Alcaraz, the tournament’s top seed, took a 3-0 lead in the first set and won the first 10 points of the second en route to a 4-0 advantage as he ended Medvedev’s 19-match winning streak.

“I played perfect,” Alcaraz said after his sixth straight sets victory in his six matches in the tournament. “Against him is always a tactic match, and I did perfect today. That’s why it looks easy, but it wasn’t.”

Alcaraz became the first Indian Wells champion to claim the title without losing a set since Roger Federer in 2017, and the first to do so in at least six matches since countryman Rafael Nadal in 2007.

Alcaraz hit 18 winners to Medvedev’s five in windy conditions at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden.

“I didn’t play my best,” the fifth-seeded Medvedev said. “Why didn’t I play my best? I don’t know. Maybe it was his ball. Maybe it was the wind and for him it was easier to go through this wind, and that’s normal. So I have no real reasons, and sometimes in tennis, you don’t have them.”

Medvedev was seeking to become the first man to win four titles in five weeks since Andy Murray in 2016.

The victory made the 19-year-old Alcaraz a three-time ATP Masters 1000 champion and the ninth and youngest man to win both legs of the Sunshine Double — the BNP Paribas Open and Miami Open — in his career.

Alcaraz joins Nadal as the only players to win at least three Masters 1,000 titles before turning 20. Nadal won six before turning 20.

Alcaraz passed Serbian Novak Djokovic to become the No. 1 player in the ATP singles rankings, a distinction he also had from Sept. 12, 2022-Jan. 29.

“It feels great to be back on the No. 1,” Alcaraz said. “Of course every player on the ATP wants to be No. 1, and for me it’s a dream come true again.”

Djokovic did not play in the tournament because he has not taken the COVID-19 vaccine and is not permitted to enter the United States.

In the women’s singles final, 10th-seeded Elena Rybakina defeated second-seeded Aryna Sabalenka, 7-6(11), 6-4, for her fourth WTA singles title and first since winning Wimbledon last summer.

Sabelenka took a 4-2 lead in the opening set, but was soon broken back for 4-4. Sabalenka, who struggled to win second-serve points all afternoon and served 10 double-faults in the opening set, saved a set point as the pair moved into a first-set tiebreaker, which included seven set points.

“This tiebreak was really epic, I would say, with all these double faults and nerves,” Rybakina said. “So in the end, it was just focusing on every point and try to fight till the end.”

Rybakina took 2-0 and 5-2 leads in the second set. Sabalenka broke Rybakina’s serve in the eighth game and held serve in the ninth, closing the gap to 5-4. Rybakina then held serve to close out the match in two hours, four minutes.

“Today I would say that I was super disappointed with my serve, so I was back to old habits,” Sabelenka said. “I was like a little bit overreacting on things, and I wasn’t there in the first two games in the second set.”

Rybakina called the first set the key to her first victory over the Belarusian in five tries, including a 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 loss in January’s Australian Open final.

“We both had chances, but in the end, it went my way,” said Rybakina, who was born in Russia and now represents Kazakhstan. “So I think it was important this first set, and then it was a bit easier to start the second with an early break.

“Then the conditions also changed a bit. In the end of the second set it became very windy, so from one side it was difficult to play. But since I had this advantage of the score I, think this was the difference today.”

The winning singles finalists both received $1,262,220 while the runners-up received $662,360.

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