Madison Keys pictures herself as a champion again at the Australian Open

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Madison Keys planned to walk into the player tunnel at Rod Laver Arena in a quiet moment when nobody was watching, and take a photo of her name listed with the other champions at the Australian Open.

After beating top-ranked Aryna Sabalenka in last year's final at Melbourne Park to win her first Grand Slam title, Keys pictured the moment she'd return to the stadium for the first time as defending champion.

“I’ve always kind of remembered walking through that tunnel and seeing all the names,” she said Friday, two days before the first major of the year starts. “It was a little bit of a pinch-me moment where I was like, ‘Wow, I’m going to be up there.’

“I have not seen my name in the tunnel yet. I hope I can go in there when there’s no one else so I can take a picture and send it to my mom."

Before facing the media in Melbourne, she couldn't help but notice other evidence at the venue of her breakthrough triumph.

“There’s a really cool photo of me holding the trophy," Keys said. “Getting to see those, it’s something you dream of in your career.”

The 30-year-old American said it was easy to look back almost 12 months and think everything worked to perfection, but "also you think about, ‘Wow, I almost lost.’

"I was match point down. So many three-set matches. There were some ugly matches. I think it kind of just makes everything a little bit better just because it wasn’t issue-free.”

Keys won a tune-up tournament in Adelaide in 2025 before ending Sabalenka's 20-match winning streak at the Australian Open. At 29, she was the tournament's oldest first-time women's champion. She also set a record as the player with the longest gap between their first two Grand Slam finals — her first was the 2017 U.S. Open.

The Australian Open victory launched her into a Top 5 ranking the following month. After the breakthrough, though, she was ousted in the French Open quarterfinals, the third round at Wimbledon and had a nervy first-round exit at the U.S. Open. At the season-ending WTA Finals, she lost two group-stage matches.

Sabalenka, meanwhile, admitted Friday that the loss here to Keys last year was tough.

“She played incredible and overplayed me. Took me a little time to recover,” she said. “We had matches after that. I worked on my mistake on those matches.

“Going to this AO, I’m not really focusing on that last year result but of course I would like to do just a little bit better than I did last year!”

Sabalenka, who beat Keys in the quarterfinals last week en route to the Brisbane International title, plays her first-round match Sunday night against Tiantsoa Rakotomanga Rajaonah, a wild-card entry from France.

Keys also lost in the quarterfinals in her title defense in Adelaide earlier this week. But she's taking it in her stride as she prepares for another career first: defending a major title.

“Even though I’ve been on tour for a long time, this is also still my first experience as that,” she said. “I’m really just trying to soak in all of the really cool fun parts."

Seeded ninth and on the other side of the draw from Sabalenka, Keys is scheduled to open against Oleksandra Oliynykova of Ukraine.

“Yes, I’m sure going on court I’m going to be very nervous," she said, "but I don’t think I’ve ever walked on court first round of a Grand Slam and not been nervous.”

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