LONDON -- At a certain point, Serena Williams started screaming, too. It was a howl of competitive rage in answer to Victoria Azarenka. All of a sudden. Azarenka's cries of exertion seemed like nothing more than the call of a whip-poor-will. The crowd in Wimbledon's Center Court began to murmur and then to laugh at the dying warbles from Azarenka, and guttural answers from Williams. Game, set, match.
Who is going to stop the history-chasing Williams at this Wimbledon? Maria Sharapova, with those leaf-raking strokes, and her frail mysterious flights of mind and mid-match absences? Don't think so. The best chance came and went, in a quarterfinal match between Williams and Azarenka that etched itself on the senses, the eyes and the ears, with the quality of play. For more than an hour, they might as well have gone at each other with broadswords, before Williams rallied from a set down to advance, 3-6, 6-2, 6-3.
"The difference? I don't know what the difference was," a depleted Williams said afterward.
But Azarenka knew what it was: Williams blasted the court with 46 winners (to just 12 errors) and 17 blistering, gyrating aces, leaving a memory of chalk exploding like ground-level starbursts. In a season in which Williams has lost just one match and is pursuing a calendar sweep of the four grand slam events, in a career in which she is going for her 21st major championship, it's a terrifying truth that she has never, ever been better.
"We just saw today why Serena is No. 1," Azarenka said. "I haven't seen her play like this, honestly."
Whenever two women fill a court with high-pitched noises, it's remarked on, but in fact there was something compelling about the soundtrack of the duel between Williams and Azarenka. The sounds were expressions of breathless exertion from one corner of the court to another, pure heat on every shot, and how much they valued each point. Sometimes the noises were wheezes, sometimes deep organ-like exhalations. But Williams's purely primal screams early in the second set signaled the change in momentum. Azarenka had taken the first with a series of lacerating groundstrokes that left Williams diving or wrong-footed.
Williams was vulnerable, and she knew it. She was up against one of the few players in the world capable of outhitting her. No one has played her tougher on more big occasions, than Azarenka, a two-time Australian Open champion who has been close, very close, to knocking Williams off in majors. In the 2012 U.S. Open final, Azarenka was just two points away from the title, before Williams rallied for a 6-2, 2-6, 7-5 victory. In the 2013 U.S. Open final, Williams had to battle for almost three hours before winning, 7-5, 6-7 (6-8), 6-1 in a match that Azarenka said afterward was like "boiling water or something."
Azarenka so craves a big victory over Williams that in March, she even hired Williams's ex-hitting partner Sacha Bajin. Williams and Bajin had worked together for eight years, a period covering 10 of her grand slam titles, and it was partly the eggcrate-abdominaled Bajin's drive on the practice court and in the gym that helped give Williams such a deep well of fitness.
Williams pretended to be unbothered, and even tweeted, "don't have too much fun without me congrats Sasha." But it was a naked challenge to the world's best player.
"I will do anything I can, anything, to be able to not just beat Serena but to win Wimbledon," Azarenka said.
In May, with Bajin on her side, Azarenka pushed Williams to the absolute limit at the Madrid Open, going up 6-5 in the third set and had three match points against her -- only to lose, 7-6, 3-6, 7-6.
That was the backstory when Williams began to howl on Center Court. It was early in the second set, with almost every game a multiple-deuce affair with furious rallies. "We were just giving our all out there, literally we gave everything we had," Williams said.
The turning point came with Azarenka serving on break point at 2-3. Azarenka lashed a scathing backhand cross, but Williams anticipated it. She got there in fully extended stride, and rolled a wicked-angled reply that strafed the net and landed right at Azarenka's shoe tops. Azarenka dove for a half-volley -- but framed the ball into the net to give up the game.
The rest was a classic Williams storm surge. Azarenka seemed to go a little slack, while Williams continued to lift her game notch after notch. There was a huge, heavy forehand buried in a corner to break Azarenka in her opening service game of the final set. There was a door-slamming three-ace game to hold for a 5-2 lead.
"I just felt like I was never really up," Williams said. "It was just fighting, fighting, fighting."
You could choose any one of a number of strengths to explain Williams' staggering dominance this season. The strength-fed groundstrokes that land with the weight of bowling balls. The magnificent, rope-flexible serve that so often resolves a crisis in her favor. But none of it is as important as that desperate, shouting temperament, the cry aloud combativeness, the tendency to feel and play as if she's at a deficit even when she is ahead.
"She has fury," Tennis Channel analyst Mary Carillo says. "It's a gift."
If Azarenka can't beat Williams on her best day, it's hard to imagine that semifinal opponent Sharapova can do any better. Williams is 17-2 against her, including victories in their past 16 meetings. When Azarenka was asked if she had a tip for Sharapova, a recommendation for how to beat Williams when she is in this kind of physical and temperamental form, Azarenka paused for just a beat.
"If I had one," she said, "I would have used it today."
Sports on 07/08/2015