Preview: What does Indian Wells mean in October? For the WTA, it will be a much-needed late-season blockbuster

My Tennis Life: Tennys Sandgren

When it’s played in March, Indian Wells is a harbinger event. We look to it for clues about the season to come. What will it mean in October? For the women, it will be a much-needed late-year blockbuster. The WTA’s Asian swing has been canceled—including its $4 million mandatory in Beijing—and its season-ending championships moved to Mexico. This will likely be the last time that much of the Top 10 gets together before then. A few important names are missing, including Naomi Osaka, Ash Barty, and Aryna Sabalenka, but a lot more are here. That includes the talk of the tennis world, 18-year-old Emma Raducanu and 19-year-old Leylah Fernandez, and the 2003 and 2005 Indian Wells champion, 38-year-old Kim Clijsters.

Let’s see who can keep their 2021 success going, and who might make a late run.

First Quarter

Karolina Pliskova has been on a quasi-roll. After a run of mid-season futility, she made the finals at Wimbledon and in Montreal, the semis in Cincinnati, and the quarters at the US Open. One thing she didn’t do during that streak is win a tournament. With Barty and Sabalenka out, Pliskova will take a rare turn as the No. 1 seed in Indian Wells, and the hard courts and thin desert air have helped her serve-first game here before—she has made the quarterfinals or better the last three times the tournament was played. This time she’ll start against either Caty McNally or Saisai Zheng.

But getting out of the quarterfinals in this section won’t be easy. Bianca Andreescu, the defending champion from 2019, is here and seemingly healthy; as are two-time 2021 Slam semifinalist Maria Sakkari, Ons Jabeur, Danielle Collins, and Anett Kontaveit, who is coming off a title run in Ostrava.

Potential third-round matches to watch: Andreescu vs. Kontaveit; Collins vs. Jabeur.

Semifinalist: Sakkari

Second Quarter

Barbora Krejcikova doesn’t seem to have had any trouble switching surfaces or dealing with any increased expectations that may have come after her breakthrough at Roland Garros. Since then, she’s won a title in Prague, and made the quarters in Cincinnati and New York, all on hard courts. Now she’s the third seed in Indian Wells, with what would seem to be a manageable road to the semifinals. If the seeds hold, she would play Camila Giorgi, Coco Gauff, and Garbiñe Muguruza to get there. Of those players, Mugu would seem to have the most mojo; she’s coming off a title in Chicago, but she also just lost to Krejcikova at the US Open.

First-round matches to watch:

Amanda Anisimova vs. 17-year-old Katrina Scott of the U.S.; Scott pushed Anisimova to a third set when they played last summer.

Clijsters vs. Katerina Siniakova

Potential third-round matches to watch: Krejcikova vs. Giorgi; Gauff vs. Paula Badosa

Semifinalist: Krejcikova

Third Quarter

The last time many of us saw Elina Svitolina, she was losing one of the best matches of the year, to Leylah Fernandez in the US Open quarterfinals. Even in defeat, Svitolina was mostly great that day, and she’ll start Indian Wells as the top seed in this section, with a plausible path at least to the quarterfinals. The three seeds in her half are Elise Mertens, Jessica Pegula, and Sorana Cirstea.

But the fireworks in this section may go off in the top half: That’s where Raducanu and Simona Halep, and Petra Kvitova and Victoria Azarenka, could meet in a pair of third-rounders.

Young American to watch: 17-year-old wild card Ashlyn Krueger, who starts against Tereza Martincova

Semifinals: Halep

Fourth Quarter

With the absences at the top of the rankings, Iga Swiatek makes a meteoric rise to the No. 2 spot in the draw. She has also landed in an enviable quarter: The seeds on her side are Veronika Kudermetova, Jelena Ostapenko, and Elena Rybakina. You never know exactly what you’ll get from Swiatek, but she can beat any of those opponents on a decent day. On the other side, there’s Belinda Bencic, Jil Teichmann, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, and Fernandez.

First-round match to watch: Madison Keys vs. Kaia Kanepi

Potential third-round match to watch: Fernandez vs. Pavlyuchenkova

Semifinalist: Bencic

Semifinals: Sakkari d. Krejcikova; Halep d. Bencic

Final: Sakkari d. Halep