NEW YORK (AP) — How well do you know the tennis career of 23-time Grand Slam singles champion Serena Williams, who has indicated this will be her final U.S. Open — and perhaps the final tournament of her career? Play begins at Flushing Meadows in New York on Monday. Give this AP quiz about the 40-year-old American a try:
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1st Round: Where was Williams born? (Bonus: In which city?)
a.) California
b.) Michigan
c.) New York
d.) Florida
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2nd Round: Who was the opponent in the first professional singles match Williams contested? (Bonus: Who was the first opponent in her first Grand Slam match?)
a.) Annie Miller
b.) Arantxa Sanchez Vicario
c.) Irina Spirlea
d.) Venus Williams
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3rd Round: How many singles championships has Williams won at the U.S. Open? (Bonus: Who holds the record for most women’s titles at the Open in the professional era, which began in 1968?)
a.) 4
b.) 5
c.) 6
d.) 7
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4th Round: Williams’ older sister, 42-year-old Venus, is a seven-time Grand Slam singles champion. How many times have there been Williams vs. Williams matchups at tour-level events? (Bonuses: How many of those were at the U.S. Open? And how many were in Grand Slam finals?)
a.) 11
b.) 21
c.) 31
d.) 41
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Quarterfinals: How many times since 1998 — the year she made her U.S. Open debut — has Williams led the tournament in aces?
a.) Zero
b.) 5
c.) 10
d.) 15
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Semifinals: Connect the number of match wins in singles at the U.S. Open — or its precursor, the U.S. Championships — with the name of the player whose total is represented. (Bonus: What is Williams’ career winning percentage at the Open in singles?)
a.) 89
b.) 98
c.) 101
d.) 106
w.) Serena Williams
x.) Roger Federer
y.) Chris Evert
z.) Jimmy Connors
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Final: How many players have won more Grand Slam matches in tennis history than Williams? (Bonus: How many match victories does Williams have?)
a.) Zero
b.) 1
c.) 2
d.) 3
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ANSWERS
1st Round. b. Williams was born in Michigan, on Sept. 26, 1981. Her family then moved to California, where she began playing tennis, and eventually Florida, where the sisters worked with coach Rick Macci. (Bonus: Saginaw.)
2nd Round. a. Williams was a little more than a month past her 14th birthday on Oct. 28, 1995, when she lost 6-1, 6-1 to Miller, who was 18 and ranked 149th at the time. That match came in the first round of qualifying at an event played indoors at Quebec City, Canada. Williams’ first Grand Slam match came against sixth-seeded Irina Spirlea at the 1998 Australian Open — and Williams won, 6-7 (5), 6-3, 6-1, before losing to Venus in the second round.
3rd Round: c. Williams won the event in 1999 — her first major singles trophy anywhere — and followed that up in 2002, 2008, 2012, 20013 and 2014. (Bonus: Williams and Chris Evert share the Open era record of six trophies in New York. Molla Bjurstedt Mallory won the U.S. Championships eight times in the 1910s and 1920s; Helen Wills did so seven times in the 1920s and 1930s.)
4th Round. c. Serena leads Venus 19-12. Their most recent meeting came at Lexington, Kentucky, in 2020, with Serena winning 3-6, 6-3, 6-4. (Bonuses: Six of those meetings came at the U.S. Open, and Serena leads there, too, 4-2. That includes two finals at Flushing Meadows, which they split: Venus won in 2001; Serena won in 2002. Overall, the sisters have played each other in nine Grand Slam finals, with Serena holding a 7-2 edge).
Quarterfinals. d. Williams led the U.S. Open in aces 15 times in that span, including with 70 apiece during the 1999 and 2020 tournaments, the most by a woman in New York since ace stats first were kept in 1991.
Semifinals. a-x; b-z; c-y; d-w. No one has won more matches in the history of the tournament now known as the U.S. Open than Williams, with 106. Evert ranks second among women. Connors leads the men’s standings, followed by Federer. (Bonus: Williams owns a 106-14 career record at the Open, a winning percentage of .883 that ranks eighth in history among all women and men who have played at least 50 matches there).
Final. b. In the long history of Grand Slam tennis, which dates to the 1880s, only Roger Federer, with 369, has won more matches than Williams has at the sport’s four most prestigious tournaments — the Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon and U.S. Open. (Bonus: Williams has won 365 of her 420 career matches at majors entering the 2022 U.S. Open).
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