Zverev and Rybakina win U.S. Open titles as rankings shift
At the recently concluded U.S. Open, Alexander Zverev captured the men's singles title and Elena Rybakina took the women's singles crown.
In recent seasons, the men's game had grown more predictable while the women's circuit produced frequent change; starting Wimbledon 2023 Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner won 11 of the 13 Majors in that span, while there were nine different women's winners over the same period. That pattern reversed at this U.S. Open, where the men's draw lost Sinner before the tournament and Alcaraz in the quarterfinals.
Zverev's triumph in New York was his second Grand Slam singles trophy and his first at Flushing Meadows. The last four on the men's side comprised Zverev, Ben Shelton, Frances Tiafoe and Karen Khachanov, and Zverev entered that quartet as the only player with prior major-winning experience after seizing his maiden top prize at the 2026 French Open. The 29-year-old's two major wins came in tournaments described in the coverage as having relatively open fields.
Across his victories at Roland-Garros and the U.S. Open, Zverev faced just one top-10 opponent — Shelton in the final on Sunday. Sandwiched between those title successes was a Wimbledon final appearance in which he contested Jannik Sinner "tooth and nail." Coverage of the event also stated that Zverev is among the three best players in the world along with Alcaraz and Sinner.
On the women's side, Rybakina secured her third Major and her first in New York after defeating top seed and two-time defending champion Aryna Sabalenka and then No. 4, 2023 U.S. Open winner Coco Gauff, back to back. The WTA top-four all reached the semifinals, and Rybakina's run concluded with her being crowned the new World No. 1, ending Sabalenka's 99 straight weeks at the top.
Sabalenka, who is 28 years old, has lost four of her last five Grand Slam finals and all of those defeats occurred while she held the World No. 1 ranking. Her record in finals while the top-ranked woman stands at 7-7, a 50% success rate noted in the coverage.
The tournament coverage warned that the absence of a stronger field should not be used to diminish Zverev's achievement, and it described his emergence as reinforcing the idea of a new Big Three in men's tennis. Those shifts coincided with Novak Djokovic — identified in the coverage as a 24-time major winner and a 39-year-old Serbian — losing in the first round and tumbling out of the ATP top 10, leaving for the first time since the early 2000s none of Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Djokovic ranked inside the top 10.