Steady vs. surprises: Previewing the 2024 singles finals in Montreal and Toronto

Jessica Pegula vs. Amanda Anisimova

“I’m pretty surprised with how well I’ve been able to do so far,” Amanda Anisimova said of her week in Toronto on Sunday.

She’s surely not the only one who feels that way. To say her performance has been unexpected would be an understatement. The New Jersey native has never won a title, and had never made a WTA 1000 final before today. She took a nine-month mental health break from the sport in 2023, and she was ranked 132nd to start the week.

But after a hit-and-miss first seven months of 2024, Anisimova, a former Roland Garros semifinalist, finally started to gain some traction at the Mubadala Citi DC Open earlier this month. She made the quarterfinals there, and this week she exploded, knocking off four Top 10 seeds—Daria Kasatkina, Aryna Sabalenka, Anna Kalinskaya (in a retirement), and Emma Navarro in a three-set semifinal on Sunday.

“This is a huge accomplishment for me, and something I’ve been working really hard towards,” said Anisimova, who seems to be enjoying the rigors of competition for the first time in years. “I’m still hungry for more.”

Can she get one more, and her third WTA title at any level? She’ll need to do it against a countrywoman, and the highest seed she’s played yet, No. 3 Jessica Pegula, who is also the defending champion.

Pegula and Anisimova—who is still, by the way, only 22—have played once, earlier this year on clay in Charleston, and Pegula won in a third-set tiebreak. She has also had the more successful 2024, winning a title in Berlin and reaching three other semifinals, with a new coaching team. The Buffalo native obviously likes it up north; she has won 16 of 18 in Canada.

Both women are hard-courters at heart, but they approach the surface in opposing ways. On Monday, Anisimova will be the puncher, and Pegula the counter-puncher, and that’s exactly how both will want it. At 5-foot-11, Anisimova needs to be on the offensive, and she has some of the easiest power and cleanest ball-striking in the women’s—and possibly the men’s—game. But Pegula typically thrives against that type of pace. She has no trouble absorbing and redirecting it.

The match will be on Anisimova’s racquet, and probably in her mind as well. She hasn’t always handled those rigors of competition well in the past; how will she handle them in her first 1000 final? I’ll take the steadier and more-experienced Pegula to win this race in the end. Winner: Pegula

Andrey Rublev vs. Alexei Popyrin

Skipping the Olympics is a big decision for any athlete, but it may have paid off, at least in the short run, for Andrey Rublev.

“The idea was to be more ready for Canada,” the Russian said on Sunday. “So if I’m in the final, it means we did really well.”

Rublev is indeed in the final in Montreal, after a week in which he took out the top seed, Jannik Sinner, in a three-set quarterfinal, and didn’t drop a set in any other match. His performance marks another sudden upturn in a season that has swung wildly from brilliant to mortifying. In 2024, Rublev has won a Masters 1000 title in Madrid and made the quarterfinals at the Australian Open, but he has also been defaulted form a semifinal, and suffered a meltdown during a first-round defeat at Wimbledon. Now he has a chance to win his first 1000 title on hard courts.

If anything, though, his opponent’s run to this final had been more impressive. The 25-year-old, 62nd-ranked Popyrin has defeated No. 11 Ben Shelton, No. 7 Grigor Dimitrov, No. 4 Hubert Hurkacz, and an in-form Sebastian Korda to reach his first 1000 final. In that last match, he even won a point with a broken string.

Popyrin’s rise to this point has been slow and not always so steady. A long and lanky 6-foot-5, with a lethal serve and forehand, he would seem to be built for the modern-day serve-plus-one game. But while he has two titles, and has been ranked inside the Top 40, Popyrin hasn’t had the sustained success that his adopted Australia hoped to see from him. Until, perhaps, now. With former player Xavier Malisse in his coaching box, he has begun, tentatively, to make good on his physical promise. One sign of his improvement before this week was his 6-4, 6-4 win over Rublev in Monte Carlo this spring.

Can Popyrin repeat that feat in his first final of this magnitude, against a guy who has won three 1000-level titles? As we’ve seen this week, the Aussie has the weapons to do it, and after a series of close wins, he may have the mentality, too. But I’ll take Rublev, who has the corner-to-corner firepower to get the taller Popyrin on the run, and who hasn’t spent quite as much time on court, to finish the job. Winner: Rublev