Top seed Aryna Sabalenka advanced to the third round of the National Bank Open on Tuesday with a straight-sets win over Japanese qualifier Moyuka Uchijima
Sabalenka got off to a slow start, falling behind by an early break and trailing 2-0 against Uchijima in the opening set. The 28-year-old responded by winning five consecutive games and never looked back, closing out a 6-3, 6-3 victory in 1 hour, 21 minutes to reach the third round in Toronto.
Sabalenka improved to 2-0 on the WTA Tour Driven by Mercedes-Benz against Uchijima. She also defeated the Japanese player in straight sets in the second round of the 2024 French Open.
The victory over the 111th-ranked Uchijima was Sabalenka’s eighth consecutive against a player ranked outside the Top 100. Her most recent loss to a player outside the Top 100 came against No. 164 Marketa Vondrousova in the semifinals of the 2025 Berlin Open.
Sabalenka has won 11 consecutive WTA 1000 matches against qualifiers and lucky losers. Her last defeat against a player from either category came against eventual champion Caroline Garcia in the semifinals of Cincinnati in 2022.
The win extended her hard-court winning streak to 13 matches. She won six matches each at Indian Wells and Miami earlier this year to complete the Sunshine Double.
Sabalenka improved to 24-1 on hard courts this season. Her only defeat on the surface came against Elena Rybakina in the Australian Open final. She is the first player since Serena Williams in 2015 to win 24 of her first 25 WTA-level hard-court matches of a season.
Sabalenka improved to 34-3 this season in matches where she won the opening set. All three of those defeats came on clay, in Madrid, Rome and at the French Open.
The world No. 1 will next face China’s Shuai Zhang in the third round. Zhang advanced when No. 26 seed Jelena Ostapenko retired because of injury while trailing 6-0, 4-0. The match will be the first tour-level meeting between Sabalenka and Zhang.
