By Shishir Prashant 
PrashantNews
Grand Slam tennis is rarely kind to the seedings. Upsets are part of its appeal, making the draw unpredictable and ensuring that the road to a title seldom follows the order in which players are seeded.
The 2026 US Open women’s singles tournament, however, has produced an extraordinary exception.
For only the second time in the Open Era, all four top seeds reached the semifinals at Flushing Meadows. But what makes this year’s tournament unique is what happened next: the top two seeds also advanced to the final.
Top seed and defending champion Aryna Sabalenka defeated No. 3 Jessica Pegula 7-5, 6-2, while No. 2 Elena Rybakina recovered from a set down to beat No. 4 Coco Gauff 3-6, 6-4, 6-4. Sabalenka and Rybakina will therefore contest a final that mirrors the top of the original seeding list.
The significance becomes clearer when the history is examined.
The only previous US Open women’s draw in the Open Era to send all four top seeds into the semifinals was in 1975. Chris Evert was the top seed, followed by Virginia Wade, Martina Navratilova and Evonne Goolagong. Evert defeated No. 3 Navratilova in one semifinal, while Goolagong beat No. 2 Wade in the other. Evert then defeated No. 4 Goolagong 5-7, 6-4, 6-2 in the final.
In other words, 1975 had the same top-four semifinal line-up but not the same top-two final.
That is precisely what sets 2026 apart. For the first time in the US Open women’s singles in the Open Era, the tournament has followed the seeding order through both stages: Nos. 1, 2, 3 and 4 in the semifinals, followed by Nos. 1 and 2 in the championship match.
The feat is rare even beyond New York. The previous occasion at any Grand Slam when the women’s top four seeds all reached the semifinals was Wimbledon in 2009, when Dinara Safina, Serena Williams, Venus Williams and Elena Dementieva made up the last four. But the final there was contested by Serena and Venus, the No. 2 and No. 3 seeds, with Serena winning.
The 2026 US Open has therefore produced something tennis draws are designed to make possible but seldom deliver: a final between the two highest seeds after the four highest seeds had survived all the way to the semifinals.